Only Love Can Break Your Heart - Paperback

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by Ed Tarkington (Author)

"A lush mystery-within-a-coming-of-age-tale-within-a-Southern-Gothic." --NPR Books

"A richly textured portrait of small-town dysfunction and murder . . . Secrets abound, imaginations run wild." --The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Welcome to Spencerville, Virginia, 1977. Eight-year-old Rocky worships his older brother, Paul. Sixteen and full of rebel cool, Paul spends his days cruising in his Chevy Nova blasting Neil Young, cigarette dangling from his lips, arm slung around his beautiful, troubled girlfriend. Paul is happy to have his younger brother as his sidekick. Then one day, in an act of vengeance against their father, Paul picks up Rocky from school and nearly abandons him in the woods. Afterward, Paul disappears.

Seven years later, Rocky is a teenager himself. He hasn't forgotten being abandoned by his boyhood hero, but he's getting over it, with the help of the wealthy neighbors' daughter, ten years his senior, who has taken him as her lover. Unbeknownst to both of them, their affair will set in motion a course of events that rains catastrophe on both their families. After a mysterious double murder brings terror and suspicion to their small town, Rocky and his family must reckon with the past and find out how much forgiveness their hearts can hold.

Front Jacket

"A richly textured portrait of small-town dysfunction and murder . . . Secrets abound, imaginations run wild." --The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Welcome to Spencerville, Virginia, 1977. A time when teen-agers roamed wild and free. When sons worshipped God, loved their mothers, and feared their fathers. And when eight-year-old Rocky still worshipped his older brother Paul--sixteen and full of rebel cool--who was happy to have his younger brother as his sidekick, until one day things went terribly wrong between them and Paul disappeared. Seven years later, Rocky, now a teenager himself, must reckon with the past after a mysterious double murder brings terror and suspicion to their small town, and to their broken family.

"Ed Tarkington's pitch-perfect first novel pays tribute to music, love and growing up in small-town America . . . [It's] a murder mystery wrapped in the cloak of Southern Gothic charm." --Chicago Tribune

"An engrossing and surprisingly comfortable read . . . that brings to mind both Harper Lee and Stephen King's 'The Body' . . . creating a story that is at once bizarre and utterly familiar." --Washington Independent Review of Books

"I've heard it said that all good fiction is about blood, love or money. If that's true, then Ed Tarkington has hit the trifecta with his soulful first novel . . . Plainspoken yet elegant prose, with a heavy dash of good old-fashioned storytelling." --Minneapolis Star Tribune

"Fans of Kathryn Stockett's The Help will embrace debut author Tarkington's depiction of Southern life at a time of changing social mores . . . Readers who can't get enough of Wiley Cash, Ron Rash, and Brian Panowich will delight in discovering this fine new writer." --Library Journal, starred review

Number of Pages: 336

Dimensions: 1 x 8.1 x 5.5 IN

Publication Date: November 15, 2016

Accelerated Reader:

Quiz Name: Only Love Can Break Your Heart

Interest Level: Upper Grades, 9-12

Reading Level: 5.8

Point Value: 15