The Hour I First Believed

From the author of the international number one bestseller I KNOW THIS MUCH IS TRUE comes a magnificent novel of a life turned upside-down by tragedy – and the search for a way to carry on in the aftermath.

Caelum Quirkes a middle-aged schoolteacher. Students at Columbine High School generally respect him and turn to his wife Maureen, the school nurse, when in trouble. When he has to return to his home town for the funeral of his beloved aunt, Maureen promises to join him the next day – but she goes to work that morning, and that’s when the shootings happen. She hides in a cupboard, unable to see what’s happening, but listening to the students being taunted, then killed.

Life can never be the same. But what can it be? In the face of Maureen’s trauma, Caelum searches for meaning, delving into his own family history and discovering that nothing was as he’s always been told. As the couple inch towards recovery and suffer setbacks, the stories of Caelum’s redoubtable ancestors illuminate how he came to be the man he is, and how he and Maureen might live in the future with freedom and dignity. With no easy answers, Caelum gradually comes to an understanding of who he really is and what he can believe in.

Reviews

Praise for I KNOW THIS MUCH IS TRUE

‘A triumph of simple beauty’
Time

‘I Know This Much Is True never grapples with anything less than life’s biggest questions… a modern-day Dostoyevsky’
New York Times

‘Every now and then a book comes along that sets new standards for writers and readers alike. Wally Lamb’s latest novel is stunning – and even that might be an understatement’
Associated Press

‘A modern Greek tragedy… [Lamb’s] success is to present this with terrific readability, tenderness, optimism and, most surprisingly, wit… The hallmark of the book is fine writing and a commendable depth of characterisation’
The Times

‘Wally Lamb’s achievement is to force you to feel Dominick’s pain… the events in Dominick’s everyday nightmare are presented with a sneaky simplicity which generates emotional tension’
Daily Telegraph

About the author

Wally Lamb’s first novel, ‘She’s Come Undone’, won rave reviews when it was published in 1992. It was a finalist in the ‘Los Angeles Times’ First Novel Award, a Top Ten book for ‘People’ magazine and a Notable Book for the ‘New York Times’. Both ‘She’s Come Undone’ and ‘I Know This Much Is True’ have been chosen for Oprah’s Book Club. Wally Lamb now teaches writing at the University of Connecticut. He lives in Connecticut with his wife and their three sons.