What About the Bodies
A Novel
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- $19.99
Publisher Description
In this propulsive crime novel from Edgar Award nominee Ken Jaworowski, three lives collide in a gritty rust-belt town—a single mother covering up a deadly mistake, a young man on a mission to honor a dying wish, and a musician racing to escape a violent debt.
Carla, a single mom poised to finally break free from her cycle of poverty, must risk it all, including her morality, to help her son hide a terrible secret.
Reed, an autistic young man, sets out on a journey to keep a deathbed promise to the mother he just lost. Along the way he’ll encounter both kindhearted residents and a cold-blooded nemesis.
And Liz, an aspiring musician on the cusp of a breakthrough, needs to quickly come up with the cash she owes a brutal ex-con. If she can’t pay him, both her dream and her life will be in grave danger.
As these three compelling characters intersect, the novel ignites into a story filled with explosive twists, hair-raising chills, and boundless love.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Jaworowski's intense if occasionally far-fetched sophomore novel (after Small Town Sins), three vividly drawn strivers vie for fulfillment in down-and-out Locksburg, Pa. Carla Louden has mortgaged her home to finance her restaurant, which she eagerly staffs with her son, Billy, and one other underpaid employee. Carla would do anything for Billy—and she may have to, after he buries the body of his former classmate, Doreen Shippen, in the backyard. Meanwhile, autistic adult Reed sets out to make good on a promise he made to his mother on her deathbed before his brother has him institutionalized. Along the way, he meets resistance from a bullying police officer and the Locksburg rumor mill, which blames him for his mom's death. Finally, singer-songwriter Liz receives a promising call from a Nashville power player just as her boyfriend drags her into debt to a violent ex-con. Her only way out is an elaborate drug deal that will either save or tarnish her artistic ambitions. As Jaworowski's desperate, three-dimensional characters cross paths and teeter on the edge of destruction, the author raises powerful questions about poverty, fate, and the ties that bind. Though a few plot contrivances hold it back, this is a remarkably accomplished neo-noir.
