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In her stunning new novel, Morris introduces us to Gordon Loomis, who, after twenty-five years in jail for a senseless high school murder, cannot come to terms with the enormity of his crime and its violation of all that is good and right. A giant of a man, he has learned to preserve a polite low profile and meager expectations for his life. Pressed by his family to start over, he stubbornly refuses to leave his old home and neighborhood—now devastated by a quarter century of decline. A Hole in the Universe follows Gordon and the three women who care for him as they force him to confront real life.
"The plot picks up pace toward the end, reaching a fevered pitch as Gordon faces new (and unfounded) accusations, and the novel comes to a redemptive but satisfying and believable conclusion." - Publishers Weekly.
"'The dead cannot forgive, and the living have no right,' Gordon thinks. But here, in this brilliant novel, in the rare, bright bits of hope, like glimmers of shiny coins on a dirty street, Morris shows us the possibility." - The Washington Post, Caroline Leavitt.
"Her empathy for Gordon and his supporting characters in this novel, her fifth, is palpable, leaving the reader in awe of her uncanny ability to capture and convey each personality's unique essence." - Booklist.
"What Morris does with Delores and Gordon is infinitely truer and more moving-until a final-chapter resolution that's almost insultingly phony. Morris has all the tools. But they need sharpening, and better raw material." - Kirkus Reviews.
This information about A Hole in the Universe was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photo: Author website
Mary McGarry Morris was born in Meriden, Connecticut in 1943 and raised in Rutland, Vermont with three younger brothers. She was educated at Mount Saint Joseph Academy in Rutland, the University of Vermont, and the University of Massachusetts.
Her first novel Vanished was published in 1988. It was nominated for the National Book Award and the PEN/Faulkner Award. A Dangerous Woman was published in 1991 and was chosen by Time magazine as one of the "Five Best Novels of the Year." It was made into a motion picture starring Debra Winger, Barbara Hershey, and Gabriel Byrne.
Songs In Ordinary Time was published in 1995. Two years later, it was chosen as an Oprah's Book Club selection, which propelled it to the top of the New York Times bestsellers list for many weeks, as well as making ...
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