And the Dark Sacred Night: A Novel

by Julia Glass Narrated by Mark Deakins

Overview

In this richly detailed novel about the quest for an unknown father, Julia Glass brings new characters together with familiar figures from her first two novels, immersing readers in a panorama that stretches from suburban New Jersey to rural Vermont and ultimately to the tip of Cape Cod.
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Kit Noonan is an unemployed art historian with twins to help support and a mortgage to pay-and a wife frustrated by his inertia. Raised by a strong-willed, secretive single mother, Kit has never known the identity of his father-a mystery that his wife insists he must solve to move forward with his life. Out of desperation, Kit goes to the mountain retreat of his mother's former husband, Jasper, a take-no-prisoners outdoorsman. There, in the midst of a fierce blizzard, Kit and Jasper confront memories of the bittersweet decade when their families were joined. Reluctantly breaking a long-ago promise, Jasper connects Kit with Lucinda and Zeke Burns, who know the answer he's looking for. Readers of Glass's first novel, Three Junes, will recognize Lucinda as the mother of Malachy, the music critic who died of AIDS. In fact, to fully understand the secrets surrounding his paternity, Kit will travel farther still, meeting Fenno McLeod, now in his late fifties, and Fenno's longtime companion, the gregarious Walter Kinderman.
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And the Dark Sacred Night is an exquisitely memorable tale about the youthful choices that steer our destinies, the necessity of forgiveness, and the risks we take when we face down the shadows from our past.

Editorial Reviews

MAY 2014 - AudioFile

Mark Deakins takes on the persona of a man whose lack of knowledge of his father has repercussions throughout his adult life in this story of self-identity and family secrets. With specific references to his earlier novel THREE JUNES—Lucinda, mother of the music critic Malachy, who dies of AIDS, plays a significant role in this story—the novel will please Glass’s fans. But Deakins’s performance, while technically competent, is a bit passionless, a style that is at odds with this emotionally charged story of a man determined to figure out who his family is and who he himself is. J.L.K. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

Library Journal

11/15/2013
Unemployed, mortgage-trapped Kit Noonan has children to support and a restless wife who wants him to uncover his father's identity. That leads Kit to Lucinda Burns, wife of a famed senator and mother of the journalist who died of AIDs in Glass's the 2002 National Book Award winner, Three Junes. Now in his sixties, Three Junes protagonist Fenno McLeod also appears. With a nine-city tour.

MAY 2014 - AudioFile

Mark Deakins takes on the persona of a man whose lack of knowledge of his father has repercussions throughout his adult life in this story of self-identity and family secrets. With specific references to his earlier novel THREE JUNES—Lucinda, mother of the music critic Malachy, who dies of AIDS, plays a significant role in this story—the novel will please Glass’s fans. But Deakins’s performance, while technically competent, is a bit passionless, a style that is at odds with this emotionally charged story of a man determined to figure out who his family is and who he himself is. J.L.K. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

Product Details

BN ID:	2940172108044
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	04/01/2014
Edition description:	Unabridged

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