SUNRISE by Téa Obreht

4 stars

Three timelines converge overlapping in a currently abandoned Western town in Wyoming. There’s Nina, who arrives in Sunset in 2024 with little more than a few rescued protein bars after jumping, or perhaps being pushed, from a crashing small plane being piloted by her boyfriend. Nina stumbles upon a woman’s skeleton in the barn where’s she sheltered, along with both an old novel and an unfinished manuscript belonging to L. Hawley.

 The book switches between Nina and her survival in the abandoned town to events told contemporaneously from both the novel and manuscript. The old novel, An Incident at Greylock, centers around an act of bravery  in 1902 to save an isolated station from a bandit attack with the heroes being Anton Vargas, a gunslinger and subsequent traveling entertainer reenacting across the country the attack, The Preacher, a young classical trained doctor who has a habit of preaching to those around him, and Sadie, a brave transcriber who puts out the call for help. The unfinished manuscript offers up a differing version of these same events, along with Coll, an amateur historian who’s taken up Anton’s role of re-enacting the events in 2003. The manuscript that reveals deep vulnerabilities of all the so-called heroes, and also features a dying Anton returning to Sunrise to make some sort of amends with the Preacher, with whom he’s had a dramatic falling out.

The ending, with its surprise, ambiguity, and deep sadness, is where the book lost me. While it pulls all the strands together in the present day, I’m still struggling to make sense of it, especially within the context of the intense themes of survival and tenacity that infuse all the characters stories. For all the emotional depth leading up to it, I just wanted more depth in wrapping the strands together. That said, the writing was beautiful and evocative, and Obreht grqandly resurrects the story-telling tradition around the days of the Wild West.

Thanks to Random House and Netgalley for an advance reader’s copy.

Stacy DeBroff

Stacy DeBroff, founder and CEO of Mom Central.com and social and digital consultancy, Influence Central, is a social media strategist, attorney, and best-selling parenting author. A sought-after expert for national media, she trend-spots regularly with national brands and speaks frequently to national and international audiences on a wide range of subjects, including influencer marketing, social media, entrepreneurship, and consumer trends. A passionate cook, gardener, reader, and tennis player, she adores this new chapter of post-college-age parenting.