The Trouble Up North
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4.3 • 6 Ratings
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
An atmospheric, haunting novel about a family of bootleggers, their troubled history, and the land that binds them.
The Sawbrooks have lived on prime real estate on the lakes of Michigan since before there was prime real estate. A family of smugglers and bootleggers, every man, woman, and child in each generation has been taught to navigate the nooks and crannies of the rivers and highways that flow in and out of Canada. The hidden routes are the family's legacy.
But today, the Sawbrooks are deeply fractured, and the money that's sustained the family is running out. Edward, the Sawbrook patriarch, is dying from cancer, and his wife, Rhoda, is bitterly disappointed in her three adult children. The eldest daughter, Lucy, is now a park ranger, working to federally protect the land against her mother’s will; the middle son, Buckner, hasn’t been the same since he came back from the army suffering from alcoholism; and the youngest daughter, Jewell, is wasting her potential as a card player and bartender.
When Jewell is asked to commit a crime for a major insurance payout, she agrees, eager for the cash, but too late, she realizes that that the boat she torched wasn't empty...
Together, the Sawbrooks will have to contend with the old, familial ways and the new, shifting world, and face each other—and their pain-filled past—to smuggle one more thing through and out of their land to safety.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
This engrossing thriller puts family ties to a terrible test. Northern Michigan’s Sawbrook family has built its legacy on shady deals, sneaking illicit goods in and out of Canada. But with resorts and casinos flooding the region, tourism’s rising tide has led to tough times for the family. And their problems run far deeper—patriarch Edward has terminal lung cancer, and his bitter wife, Rhoda, has pretty much written off their kids. When their compulsive-gambler daughter, Jewell, commits what she thinks is a minor crime, suddenly her whole family’s loyalties are put to the test. Author Travis Mulhauser has written a compelling, twisty crime caper, but the complex family dynamics, deftly drawn characters, and sharp subtext of class struggle all work on multiple levels. Narrators Lauren Ezzo and Petrea Burchard make the Sawbrooks feel so real, you’ll want them both to star in a movie adaptation, and they know how to keep that crucial tension tight. Emotions and risks run equally high in The Trouble Up North.
