About this item
At age thirty, Kyle Boelte finds himself living in San Francisco, where the summer fog blows inland off the ocean and the landscape changes moment to moment. Amidst this ever-changing sea of fog, Boelte struggles to remember his brother Kris, who committed suicide in the familys Denver home when Boelte was just thirteen.In this impressive debut, Boelte sets up a dual narrative one investigates San Franciscos climate to explain the science behind the omnipresent fog another explores Boeltes memory as well as letters, notes, newspaper articles, and other artifacts that tell the story of his brothers short life and eventual suicide.Weaving a complex and engaging story from personal, historical and environmental threads, Boeltes search for meaning takes him to a range of unexpected places from San Francisco Bay circa 1901, when fog was responsible for routinely sinking steamships, to a cavernous medical library where he studies the grim details of asphyxiation and death by hanging from the redwood forests where scientists are now learning about fogs ability to sustain life, to a beat-up cardboard box containing memories of his long-dead brother.
About the Author
Kyle Boelte was born in a small town on the high plains of Kansas, grew up near Denver, Colorado, and moved to San Francisco as an adult. A finalist for the Annie Dillard Award, his writing has appeared in Orion Magazine, The Rumpus, and High Country News. ??The Beautiful Unseen is its own weather system: soulful, unpredictable, shadow then light. "??Terry Tempest Williams, author of Refuge"A slim book of startling prose, The Beautiful Unseen slips between past and present, inner life and outer, seamlessly and beautifully. It's that rare, treasured thing: a moving portrait of loss that never settles for easy answers. " ?? Darin Strauss, author of Half a Life"With lush, expressive imagery that conjures an uncertain emotional and physical terrain, Boelte conveys the deep, abiding sense of loss such tragedies inflict, yet softly, tenderly communicates the conflicting sensations of confronting memories, both lost and found. " ?? Booklist (Starred Review) "Boelte??s sure-footed prose makes The Beautiful Unseen a lovely journey. And a moving one. " ?? Los Angeles Review of BooksBy bringing so many creative resources to The Beautiful Unseen, Boelte defies his brother??s act of self-negation, coming into his own power by refusing to look away from the most ravaging edges of his grief. What could have been the story of a lonely and inexplicable death instead becomes a celebration of human perseverance in all its irreducible complexity. ?? San Francisco Chronicle
