Light from a Distant Star: A Novel

by Mary McGarry Morris Narrated by Amy Rubinate

Overview

A gripping coming-of-age novel with a murder at its heart and a heroine as unforgettable as Harper Lee's Scout

Light from a Distant Star is the moving and powerful story of innocence and betrayal told in the endearingly wise voice of thirteen-year-old Nellie Peck. It is early summer, and her beloved father's business is failing. Her mother has to go back to work, and Nellie's older half sister has launched a troubling search for her birth father. Forced to take care of her shy younger brother, Nellie is determined to make him-and herself-toughen up. Three strangers enter Nellie's protected life: mysterious and brutish Max Devaney works in her grandfather's junkyard, the thieving Bucky Saltonstall has just arrived from New York City, and Dolly Bedelia, a young stripper who rents the small apartment in the back of the Pecks' house, becomes the titillating focus of Nellie's eavesdropping.

Nellie is justly proud of her own infallible lie detector until violence erupts in her young life and she is silenced by fear and scandal. The truth as she believes it is shocking and unthinkable, and with everyone's eyes riveted on her in the courtroom, Nellie finds herself compromised by moral confusion. No one will listen, no one believes her, and a man's life hangs in the balance.

A stunning evocation of innocence lost, Light from a Distant Star stands as one of the most engaging novels yet from the bestselling author of Songs in Ordinary Time.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

“A timeless and timely look at small town life….Morris' page-turner, (which evokes To Kill a Mockingbird) will satisfy her fans and send new readers searching for her earlier titles.”—The Washington Post

"Morris' finely crafted prose—simple and lyrical—captures perfectly that sliver of pre-adolescence when the very world around us seems to shudder and shift, when the adults we admire suddenly reveal their flaws, and everything we treasure seems to be slipping away."—Associated Press

“A timeless and timely look at small town life….Morris' page-turner, (which evokes To Kill a Mockingbird) will satisfy her fans and send new readers searching for her earlier titles.”—Publishers Weekly 

“Mary McGarry Morris doesn't so much tell a story as spin a delicate and powerful web. With her elegant prose, beautifully drawn characters, and perfect pitch dialog, she lured me in.  And with her intense and gripping plot, she had me ensnared.  I was in love with the sensitive, smart and plucky Nellie from the very first moment I met her and I'll be thinking of her for a good long time.  Light From a Distant Star is a wonderful, powerful novel not to be missed.”—Lisa Unger, New York Times bestselling author of Fragile

"Literary accolades, film adaptations, praise from Oprah—Andover’s Mary McGarry Morris has earned them all for her suspenseful novels focused on small-town life."—Boston Magazine

"It’s impossible to set aside “Light From a Distant Star” once you begin...a riveting read."—Washington Missourian 

Library Journal

With her father's business in trouble and her mother now working, 13-year-old Nellie is the determined caretaker of her little brother. The adults she does encounter, like the stripper who rents an apartment at the back of the house, upend her life further. Then, a moment of violence lands Nellie in court as witness, where no one believes the awful truth she's trying to relay. As evidenced by her many novels, e.g., National Book Award nominee Vanished, Morris excels at family dramas with dark and tingly psychological twists, so I'm betting that this will be absorbingly good.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940169803501
Publisher:	Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Publication date:	09/13/2011
Edition description:	Unabridged

Videos