Search - Await Your Reply: A Novel

Interesting concept. Liked the twists and turns. Kept me on the edge - trying to figure things out!

Await Your Reply is a brilliant novel that awaits your reading enjoyment! Three equally captivating and seemingly disparate stories are woven together in a tale of suspense. Each involves someone on the road: Ryan, his severed hand, and his recently found father racing towards a hospital; Lucy leaving town with her high school teacher in a Maserati; Miles again searching for his disturbed identical twin at the edge of the world. Given Dan Chaon's technique—starting off with a dramatic image, then creating scenes and characters, working with no overarching concept—it is a testament to his storytelling abilities to pull off such an intricate plot. The stories unfold slowly; what seems to be the truth shifts ever so slightly with each installment. How did Ryan's hand come off? Why did George Orson take Lucy to a lighthouse-themed hotel on the edge of a dried Midwestern lake? Is Miles's brother a paranoid schizophrenic or a sociopath with far-reaching powers? These will all be answered in an entertaining story that explores the ethereal nature of human identity and sense of belonging.

A masterful magic act of sleight-of-hand narration. Indelible characters, white-knuckle suspense, family breakdowns, all written in a kind of hysterical hysteria. Who could ask for more?

Good book. Story about some lives that overlap. Features Nebraska throughout.