Böcker av Talya Tate Boerner

In this award-winning, coming-of-age novel, ten-year-old Gracie Lee struggles to make sense out of her life as an Arkansas farm girl in the early 1970s. Wise beyond her age yet imbued with child-like innocence, Gracie focuses on the three things that keep her awake at night: Solving the mystery of the man in the gray house; Surviving another school year at Savage Crossing Elementary; and, Saving her alcoholic Daddy from himself (and thereby saving the whole family and wider world). Gracie feels certain there is more to life beyond school and dull church sermons. She worries about the soldiers in Vietnam and wonders what it must be like to have been born Lisa Marie Presley from Tennessee instead of Gracie Lee Abbott from Arkansas. Mostly, she wishes her Daddy wasn't so mean. Gracie's unchecked imagination leads to Nancy Drew-type adventure. Adventure leads to trouble. She confides in unexpected characters and seeks solace in a mysterious gray house beyond the cotton field. When Gracie faces a difficult family situation, she must make a life-altering decision, one that will test the very essence of her character. "At best, most first novels indicate potential. It would be wrong to say that, when reading Talya Tate Boerner's The Accidental Salvation of Gracie Lee, I was pleasantly surprised. Actually, I was amazed. There's magic here, in a wonderfully-told story that will find a special place in any reader's heart." Jeff Guinn, New York Times bestselling author. "Boerner's prose is a wonderful medium for unspooling Gracie's story, imbued with all the snark, wonder, and colorful details that characterize childhood... The author addresses real, high-stakes issues without slathering them in melodrama or saccharine sentimentality, and her book hearkens back to an older YA tradition of stories of plucky preteen girls, spooky houses, and inevitable tragedies that help mark the turning point from childhood to adolescence. A stirring novel with a distinctive young narrator." Kirkus Reviews

For those of us who are aging along with our parents, Gene Everywhere is a wonderful companion on this journey. (Brenda Miller, author of An Earlier Life) On New Year's Day 2011, without giving the idea full consideration, Talya invites her ninety-year-old father-in-law to visit. He needs a temporary place to stay. She needs something. From the moment Gene steps into her kitchen clutching a paper sack filled with medication, NOTHING unfolds as she expects. "While often grounded in things--a red sweatshirt, a jigsaw puzzle, a toothpick, 72 ceiling tiles--at its heart Gene, Everywhere is about people in their maddening, clumsy, confounding, and ultimately triumphant attempts to connect and enrich each other's lives... Anyone who has been inspired by an older mentor will love this memoir; anyone who has not will find one in Gene." Dorene O'Brien, author of What It Might Feel Like to HopeWith the generational wisdom of Tuesdays with Morrie and the charm of A Man Called Ove, this story is for adult children everywhere.