(It takes so much energy to be plucky.) The protagonist of Katie Tallo’s first novel, DARK AUGUST (HarperCollins, 448 pp., paper; $16.99), is better than that. When she returns to her hometown — Elgin, Ontario, “a town that once was but is no more” — her instinct is to burn it down. Once Gus is back in Elgin, “she drops into the past,” with all its hurtful memories and unfinished business. Foremost among these is a case that bedeviled her mother, a police detective who died when Gus was 8 years old.

Source: New York Times August 14, 2020 18:45 UTC