About this item

Winner of the 2012 Michael L. Printz and William C. Morris Awards, this poignant and hilarious story of loss and redemption "explores the process of grief, second chances, and even the meaning of life" (Kirkus Reviews) .In the remarkable, bizarre, and heart-wrenching summer before Cullen Witter's senior year of high school, he is forced to examine everything he thinks he understands about his small and painfully dull Arkansas town. His cousin overdoses; his town becomes absurdly obsessed with the alleged reappearance of an extinct woodpecker; and most troubling of all, his sensitive, gifted fifteen-year-old brother, Gabriel, suddenly and inexplicably disappears. Meanwhile, the crisis of faith spawned by a young missionary's disillusion in Africa prompts a frantic search for meaning that has far-reaching consequences. As distant as the two stories initially seem, they are woven together through masterful plotting and merge in a surprising and harrowing climax. This extraordinary tale from a rare literary voice finds wonder in the ordinary and illuminates the hope of second chances.



About the Author

John Corey Whaley

John Corey Whaley is an American Young Adult author from Louisiana.

His first novel, WHERE THINGS COME BACK is the winner of the 2012 Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature and the 2012 William C. Morris Debut Fiction Award

Whaley was named a Spring 2011 Flying Start Author by Publishers Weekly as well as a Top Ten New Voice for Teens by the ABC Children's Group at ALA and a Spring 2011 Okra Pick from the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance. WHERE THINGS COME BACK has also been nominated for the American Library Association's Best Fiction for Young Adults 2012. He was recently selected by the National Book Foundation as a Top 5 Under 35 author, making him the first YA author to be awarded the honor.

To learn more about John Corey Whaley and WHERE THINGS COME BACK, visit www.johncoreywhaley.com



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