*'A notable fiction debut' (Publisher's Weekly) from the acclaimed author of The Weight of Water and The Pilot's Wife.
Andrew, an advertising executive in his mid-30s, returns to his hometown in upstate New York for his mother's funeral. He does not intend to stay in the slow rural backwater he left seventeen years before. But the dreams and memories persist and in the darkened farmhouse he relives that hot, bloody night when Eden Close was blinded - by the same gun that killed her father.
The enigmatic Eden had been Andrew's childhood companion. Together the two roamed summer cornfields, smoked their first forbidden cigarettes, skated, fished and fought until the tomboy turned temptress - then their friendship ended. Now, despite warnings, Andrew is drawn again to this lost, blind girl of his youth, drawn to save her from the cruel neglect she has endured for seventeen sightless years without him. But first he must discover the grisly truth about that night...
Shreve writes with power and passion - DAILY EXPRESS
Anita Shreve has a knack for wry observation and for capturing the agony of emotion - DAILY TELEGRAPH
EDEN CLOSE is a novel of sensibility. Its insights are keen, its language measured and haunting. In it a sense of loss and rapture is everywhere - NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
A first novel that turns rural gothic horrors into a story of fine, high love... - KIRKUS REVIEW
Anita Shreve teaches writing at Amherst College and divides her time between Massachusetts and New Hampshire. She began writing as a high school teacher. One of her first published stories was awarded an O Henry Prize in 1975. She became a journalist, spending three years in Kenya. Back in the US, she wrote the non-fiction books Remaking Motherhood and Women Together, Women Alone and began her first novel Eden Close. In 1989, she turned to fiction full time. She is the author of many acclaimed novels and the international number-one bestsellers The Pilot's Wife, Fortune's Rocks and Sea Glass.