Synopses & Reviews
Four modern families aboard a passenger train hurtle into the night.
One hundred and seventy years earlier their forebearers make their way in a young nation built on grand promises.
Each family follows their own path, only to find that their destinies are linked inextricably, the culmination of five generations of shared history.
Jonathan Evison's Small World is a novel that speaks to the present moment, a grand adventure that explores the American experiment in its most human and intimate aspects, a novel that asks whether America has made good on those early promises.
Humming with heart and adventure, and love and hope and ideas, Small World delivers the thrill of great storytelling straight through to its deeply satisfying conclusion.
Review
"Piece by piece, Evison successfully corrals this sprawling history into a cohesive whole, coalescing it into a vivid mosaic." BookPage (Starred Review)
Review
"Masterpiece…Such masterful strokes seem to qualify Small World as the quintessential great American novel, as Evison eloquently shows that perhaps the most authentically American ideal is the ongoing, blended palette of stories." Booklist (Starred Review)
Review
"Evison gives the story a sprightly, page-turner feel despite the sizable cast he's assembled….Without being simplistic or wearing rose-colored glasses, Evison suggests a fresh way of recognizing our relationships without melting-pot clichés." Kirkus Reviews (Starred Review)
About the Author
Jonathan Evison is the author of the novels All About Lulu; West of Here; The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving; This Is Your Life, Harriet Chance!; Lawn Boy; and Legends of the North Cascades. He lives with his wife and family in Washington State.