Wingshooters [9781936070718]

Overview

—A Booklist Book of the Year 2011
—Winner of the 2011 Midwest Booksellers Choice Award
—Winner of the first annual Indie Booksellers Choice Award

“Revoyr does a remarkable job of conveying [protagonist] Michelle’s lost innocence and fear through this accomplished story of family and the dangers of complacency in the face of questionable justice.” —Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

“A searing, anguished novel . . . The narration and pace are expertly calibrated as it explores a topic one wishes still wasn’t so current.” —Los Angeles Times

Michelle LeBeau, the child of a white American father and a Japanese mother, lives with her grandparents in Deerhorn, Wisconsin—a small town that had been entirely white before her arrival. Rejected and bullied, Michelle spends her time reading, avoiding fights, and roaming the countryside with her English springer spaniel, Brett. She idolizes her grandfather, Charlie LeBeau, an expert hunter and former minor league baseball player who is one of the town’s most respected men. Charlie strongly disapproves of his son’s marriage to Michelle’s mother, but dotes on his only grandchild, whom he calls Mikey.

This fragile peace is threatened when the expansion of the local clinic leads to the arrival of the Garretts, a young black couple from Chicago. The Garretts’ presence deeply upsets most of the residents of Deerhorn when Mr. Garrett makes a controversial accusation against one of the town leaders, who is also Charlie LeBeau’s best friend.

In the tradition of To Kill a Mockingbird, A River Runs Through It, and Snow Falling on Cedars, Revoyr’s new novel examines the effects of change on a small, isolated town, the strengths and limits of community, and the sometimes conflicting loyalties of family and justice. Set in the expansive countryside of Central Wisconsin, against the backdrop of Vietnam and the post–civil rights era, Wingshooters explores both connection and loss as well as the complex but enduring bonds of family.