"Freshwater Boys"

New from HarperCollins: Freshwater Boys: Stories by Adam Schuitema.

About the book, from the publisher:

Freshwater Boys follows a group of boys and men in struggles with nature, town legends, and themselves. The opening narratives feature adolescent or pre-adolescent boys struggling with their conceptions of manhood. Later, the stories depict grown men who find that these same struggles never go away. The narrator in “Camouflage Fall” feels out of place among the hunters and fathers as they search for a missing child. Evan Rumishek in “The Lake Effect” fights through a blizzard to prove his worth to his own wife. And in the title story, a man grieves not only his drowned son but also his own failure as a father.

The landscapes and lakescapes serve as recurring characters in the book. The boys and men wander forests—sometimes finding tranquility, sometimes finding tragedy. They climb and descend dunes. And often, they encounter the Big Lake: Lake Michigan. The idea of a Third Coast figures prominently in the book, the lake and its horizon serving as a kind of world’s end, where things come to life or pass away.

Visit the Freshwater Boys website.