Excerpt from The Gospel of Winter by Brendan Kiely, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

What was worse was that I knew people did have fears. I'd seen it briefly on the faces of everyone at CDA earlier that fall, when, on a bright, clear Tuesday morning, we all became afraid of airplanes and the word jihad. After that day, fear had become our way of life—kids, adults, it didn't matter. I'd heard the guidance counselors talking about it: "I don't know what to say to these kids. I'm afraid too!" So why did I feel like I was the only one looking for some kind of stability, some kind of normalcy, someone who could hold back the vast tide of bullshit and tell me everything is going to be okay?

Excerpted from The Gospel of Winter by Brendan Kiely. Copyright © 2014 by Brendan Kiely. Excerpted by permission of Margaret K. McElderry Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.