Valerie Geary - Everything We Lost

Saturday September 23 at 5:00 PM Valerie Geary will give a presentation on Everything We Lost, a gripping novel about strange occurrences, the bond between a brother and sister, and the power of belief.

Lucy adored her older brother Nolan; they would walk their favorite trail from their home to a rock outcrop in the unpopulated area around Bishop California to stargaze.  Nolan was a gifted storyteller and artist; he drew comics and created stories for his little sister.  They were a pair until Lucy turned 14 and her hormones kicked in, then she was ashamed of Nolan’s kooky beliefs.  Coltish and pretty, she has a serious crush on Patrick, a handsome member of the in-crowd; her brother’s behavior did not help her social standing.   

As the story opens, Lucy, now 24, is living with her father in LA.  She is unmoored, drifting through life with no clear goal or direction.  All her bright hopes and teenage fantasies ended a decade ago, the night Nolan went into the desert and disappeared without a trace.  Nolan was heavily involved in tracking UFO’s, paranoid about government conspiracies, and increasingly isolated from former friends who found his ideas strange.  Lucy’s memories of the night Nolan vanished are hazy, affected by too much strong drink, trauma, and time.  She is estranged from her mother, working part time for her father, and avoiding contact with others.  Everywhere she goes, she looks for Nolan’s face, hoping someday to see him alive and happy.  The odds are long, but she keeps looking at the faces of young men trying to keep the dream alive.

Jolted from her reclusive life with her father, events send Lucy back to Bishop, the site of her brother’s disappearance where she will have to confront her mother and do everything in her power to discover what happened the night Nolan disappeared. 

This story keeps you guessing as the narrative shifts between Lucy and Nolan.  The scenes with Lucy and Nolan as children gazing at an infinite sky and imagining are beautiful.  Tension builds as the stresses on the siblings mount. At its core, this story questions our response to those with different ideas.  It is considered perfectly normal to believe a man survived in the belly of a whale, yet someone who thinks differently, who gazes at the night sky and sees the possibility of beings from other worlds is not viewed with the same tolerance.  

Valerie Geary’s last book was set in Central Oregon. Crooked River  is the  engrossing story of two sisters who see the world very differently but overcome their youth and grief in a quest for justice. Sam McAlister was 15, her sister Ollie 10 the year their mother died suddenly shattering their sheltered lives in Eugene, Oregon.  The sisters’ father, Bear, has never been a stable presence. He lives without electricity in a Teepee erected in a meadow along the Crooked River near Terrebonne Oregon.  Honey from beehives bring him a modest income, enough to pay a paltry rent to the farmer whose meadow he calls home. Sam spent several summers with her father in the meadow, for Ollie it is all new and alien.  Bear is an outsider in the community, his bushy hair and beard, solitary existence, and lack of social graces keep him apart.  The sisters have barely arrived at their father’s Teepee when they find the body of a woman floating in the Crooked River.  Numb from the death of their mother, the girls do not tell of their disturbing discovery.   Of course, the police, aided by an abundance of incriminating evidence, focus in on Bear as prime suspect.  Both girls know Bear is innocent, Sam from all the summers spent in his gentle care, Ollie because the shimmerings, spirits of the departed, have told her so.  A killer is loose, their father on a fast track to jail, and two young girls are alone in their quest to make things right.  The story grabs you from the first page and keeps you involved as secrets are revealed and it moves to the dramatic conclusion.

Author events are free and we will have refreshments and drawings for prizes.  Please call 541-593-2525, e-mail sunriverbooks@sunriverbooks.com or stop by Sunriver Books & Music to sign up to attend.

Event date: 

Saturday, September 23, 2017 - 5:00pm to 6:30pm

Event address: 

57100 Beaver Drive
Sunriver Village Building 25
Sunriver, OR 97707
Staff Pick Badge
Everything We Lost: A Novel By Valerie Geary Cover Image
$15.99
ISBN: 9780062566423
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: William Morrow Paperbacks - August 22nd, 2017

Staff Pick Badge
Crooked River: A Novel By Valerie Geary Cover Image
$16.99
ISBN: 9780062326607
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: William Morrow Paperbacks - July 21st, 2015