It is very much our lucky month, kicking off with a visit from ANNIE HARTNETT that coincides with the paperback release of her book, which happens to be one of our top-selling books of 2022, Unlikely Animals!
Where’s Kermit the Frog when you need him – Yaaayyyyy!
This book was a joy to read that was only matched by the joy in selling it and sharing it with others. Sometimes, we felt we couldn’t do it justice in our descriptions – there is a fox (not real), people talking from the cemetery (also not real), a young woman who reluctantly comes home after failing to thrive in the wider world (very real), a cast of quirky characters, drugs, brain tumors, and a missing best friend (estranged). There is even a bear – because it’s set in New Hampshire!
We didn’t think Annie could top 2017’s Rabbit Cake, but then she did! Both books will be available for sale. Come meet Annie! Hear how she came up with Unlikely Animals and get the scoop on what she’s working on next. This night will be a treat!
Here is the official description of the book:
Natural-born healer Emma Starling once had big plans for her life, but she’s lost her way. A medical school dropout, she’s come back to small-town Everton, New Hampshire, to care for her father, who is dying from a mysterious brain disease. Clive Starling has been hallucinating small animals, as well as having visions of the ghost of a long-dead naturalist, Ernest Harold Baynes, once known for letting wild animals live in his house. This ghost has been giving Clive some ideas on how to spend his final days.
Emma arrives home knowing she must face her dad’s illness, her mom’s judgment, and her younger brother’s recent stint in rehab, but she’s unprepared to find that her former best friend from high school is missing, with no one bothering to look for her. The police say they don’t spend much time looking for drug addicts. Emma’s dad is the only one convinced the young woman might still be alive, and Emma is hopeful he could be right. Someone should look for her, at least. Emma isn’t really trying to be a hero, but somehow she and her father bring about just the kind of miracle the town needs.
Set against the backdrop of a small town in the throes of a very real opioid crisis, Unlikely Animals is a tragicomic novel about familial expectations, imperfect friendships, and the possibility of resurrecting that which had been thought irrevocably lost.