Crooked River: A Novel

by Valerie Geary

Overview

With the inventiveness and emotional power of Promise Not to Tell, The Death of Bees, and After Her, a powerful literary debut about family and friendship, good and evil, grief and forgiveness.

He is not evil. I am not good.

We are the same: broken and put back together again.

Still grieving the sudden death of their mother, Sam and her younger sister Ollie McAlister move from the comforts of Eugene to rural Oregon to live in a meadow in a teepee under the stars with Bear, their beekeeper father. But soon after they arrive, a young woman is found dead floating in Crooked River, and the police arrest their eccentric father for the murder.

Fifteen-year-old Sam knows that Bear is not a killer, even though the evidence points to his guilt. Unwilling to accept that her father could have hurt anyone, Sam embarks on a desperate hunt to save him and keep her damaged family together.

I see things no one else does.

I see them there and wish I didn’t. I want to tell and can’t.

Ollie, too, knows that Bear is innocent. The Shimmering have told her so. One followed her home from her mom’s funeral and refuses to leave. Now, another is following Sam. Both spirits warn Ollie: the real killer is out there, closer and more dangerous than either girl can imagine.

Told in Sam and Ollie’s vibrant voices, Crooked River is a family story, a coming of age story, a ghost story, and a psychological mystery that will touch reader’s hearts and keep them gripped until the final thrilling page.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062326607
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	07/21/2015
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	5.31(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.79(d)

About the Author

Valerie Geary is the author of Crooked River, a finalist for the Ken Kesey Award. Her short stories have been published in The Rumpus and Day One. She lives in Portland, Oregon with her family.

Editorial Reviews

From its gruesome first image through its three hundred taut pages—Valerie Geary’s novel is a well-conceived, psychologically dense thrill-ride. At turns surprising and imaginative, this book is nearly impossible to put down.” — Pauls Toutonghi, Author of RED WEATHER and EVEL KNIEVEL DAYS

“CROOKED RIVER is a novel coursing with secrets and unasked questions....This novel is a literary thriller and a psychological study of the effects of loss, but most importantly, it’s a damn fine book.” — Wiley Cash, New York TImes bestselling author of A LAND MORE KIND THAN HOME and THIS DARK ROAD TO MERCY

“An absorbing mystery.” — Library Journal

“Crooked River is an ambitious debut with a beautiful soul. Geary’s dark pen is lyrical and tender boasting clever dialogue and provocative prose.” — Lisa O'Donnell, bestselling author of THE DEATH OF BEES

“The narrative skill displayed is impressive… readers will have a hard time putting this one down.” — Booklist

“[A] swift and beguiling read… [Sam] is finely drawn, an update on Harper Lee’s Scout.” — BookPage

“Crooked River is as much a coming-of-age novel as it is a well-paced mystery…Geary takes teenage Sam through a looking-glass and then pulls her back with an adult’s sense of loyalty and compassion—a journey equally worthwhile for all of us.” — Shelf Awareness

“[Valerie Geary] captures her readers at once and doesn’t let them go.” — Oklahoma City Oklahoman

From the Publisher

The narrative skill displayed is impressive… readers will have a hard time putting this one down.

Booklist

Crooked River is as much a coming-of-age novel as it is a well-paced mystery…Geary takes teenage Sam through a looking-glass and then pulls her back with an adult’s sense of loyalty and compassion—a journey equally worthwhile for all of us.

Shelf Awareness

[A] swift and beguiling read… [Sam] is finely drawn, an update on Harper Lee’s Scout.

BookPage

From its gruesome first image through its three hundred taut pages—Valerie Geary’s novel is a well-conceived, psychologically dense thrill-ride. At turns surprising and imaginative, this book is nearly impossible to put down.

Pauls Toutonghi

CROOKED RIVER is a novel coursing with secrets and unasked questions....This novel is a literary thriller and a psychological study of the effects of loss, but most importantly, it’s a damn fine book.

Wiley Cash

[Valerie Geary] captures her readers at once and doesn’t let them go.

Oklahoma City Oklahoman

Crooked River is an ambitious debut with a beautiful soul. Geary’s dark pen is lyrical and tender boasting clever dialogue and provocative prose.

Lisa O'Donnell

The narrative skill displayed is impressive… readers will have a hard time putting this one down.

Booklist

2014-07-30
Two sisters growing up in rural Oregon find their world shaken when they stumble across a dead woman in the river that runs through their father's property. Ollie, who's 10, and 15-year-old Sam aren't just sisters—they're best friends, brought closer by their childhoods in a semifunctional family. After their father leaves, the girls' mom must raise them on her own. When their dad—nicknamed "Bear"—eventually resurfaces, he takes up living alone in the woods, where they see him infrequently. That is, until their mother dies of a heart attack and the sisters must move in with Bear and adapt to his crunchy nature-man lifestyle. His way of life is far from traditional, but the girls love it—he lives in a teepee in a meadow, with beekeeping as his primary source of income. The body the girls discover is at the center of the somewhat predictable mystery story that follows. The sisters, who alternately serve as narrators with very different voices (though Ollie is only 10, she reads as older), are increasingly consumed with solving the woman's bludgeoning death. Most townspeople don't seem surprised when Bear is fingered for the crime, though Sam and Ollie never believe their father is guilty. The girls spend the remainder of the novel trying to pinpoint the real criminal and save their dad from a jail sentence (which would leave them parentless). This is primarily a whodunit peppered with supernatural ghost talk (Ollie sees spirits she calls "The Shimmering," who follow her throughout the tale). Unfortunately, much of the paranormal subplot is tepid; Geary is a solid writer, though some of her phrasing can veer toward the overwrought, and some of the "country speak" she makes the characters engage in feels awkward. The book's core mystery is also disappointing—the identification of the dead woman's killer doesn't feel revelatory or surprising. A slightly jumbled debut that, while well-written, could have gone places it didn't quite manage to reach.

Kirkus Reviews