The Leaf Boats [Hardcover]

John Fink (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1991

One of Dutch Gillespie's eight children is found raped and murdered much the same way her mother had been years before, in a story of a family's secrets and its disintegration.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This splendid first novel by the editor of Ford Times portrays with deep sensitivity a family seemingly doomed by repeated tragedies. At its heart is "Dutch" Gillespie, 79, a retired Chicago banker who sired four children by his first wife and three by his second, the enchanting, twice-divorced Natalie, a former go-go dancer and rock singer who was 20 and the mother of a young son when he, then 50, married her. As the story opens, the withered but still dominant Dutch, who masks his romantic nature with icy rages that frighten his offspring, lives alone in an apartment overlooking the park in Skokie where Natalie was raped and murdered 16 years ago. After a dark and stormy night, during which his son Frank's house collapses, morning brings a new catastrophe--Nora Gillespie lies slain near the spot in the park where her mother was found so long ago. It soon becomes apparent that another sibling knows more about both murders than she's willing to reveal. Fink makes us care so much for his suffering characters that we forget the preposterous nature of his story and pursue it to its bloody, fiery and satisfying end.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 213 pages
• Publisher: St Martins Pr; 1st edition (April 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312049773
• ISBN-13: 978-0312049775
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,357,697 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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