Overview:
In 1956, when divorced, working-mom Ava Lark rents a house with her twelve-year-old son, Lewis, in a Boston suburb, the neighborhood is less than welcoming. Lewis yearns for his absent father, befriending the only other fatherless kids: Jimmy and Rose. One afternoon, Jimmy goes missing. The neighborhood in the era of the Cold War, bomb scares, and paranoia seizes the opportunity to further ostracize Ava and her son. Lewis never recovers from the disappearance of his childhood friend. By the time he reaches his twenties, he's living a directionless life, a failure in love, estranged from his mother. Rose is now a schoolteacher in another city, watching over children as she was never able to watch over her own brother. Ava is building a new life for herself in a new decade. When the mystery of Jimmy's disappearance is unexpectedly solved, all three must try to reclaim what they have lost.
"From the lockstep '50s into the do-your-own-thing '60s, Caroline Leavitt follows her cast of lonely characters as they grapple with the sorrowful mystery of a missing child. 'Are any of our children safe?' one asks, and of course the answer is no, no one is. Like Mona Simpson's Off Keck Road, Is This Tomorrow is an intimate meditation on time, loss and destiny."
Stewart O'Nan, author of Emily, Alone and The Odds
"Heart-wrenching..sympathetic. This tale of domestic suspense builds to a shocking climax and will appeal to anyone immersed in suburban lore." Library Journal
"When a 12-year-old boy disappears from his suburban Boston neighborhood, ripples spread. The mystery is set up early, so there is plenty of time to get involved and invested in characters you care about, or are distrustful of, or ones whose motives you question. The overwhelming arc of the story is for these characters you come to feel protective of to get beyond the tragedy. How can you get to tomorrow when time is forever stuck on one tragic day? You want them to find their tomorrows. And thanks to great writing, I was pulling for them all the way."Candace Purdom, Anderson's Bookshop
"In the spirit of Richard Yates' novel Revolutionary Road, Caroline Leavitt peels back the neat façade of suburban life in the 1950s to uncover the ways in which the demands of conformity leave a trail of loneliness and pain for those who lie outside its bounds. Blending taut suspense with deeply moving portrayals of fierce parental love, childhood friendships and first crushes, Leavitt has created a novel with haunting characters and much to say about how we move through tragedy. "Libby Cowles, Maria's Bookshop
Leavitt has a way of crafting the loveliest novels out of tragedy. Like its predecessor, Pictures of You (2011), her latest work, set mainly in the 1950s, turns on a single fateful incident: the disappearance of 12-year-old Jimmy Rearson. It's her examination of loss, grief, and disappointment that will engross readers. But Leavitt's most captivating creation is the mercurial Ava, an accidental trailblazer who refuses to deny her dreams. It is Ava, ultimately, who points the way forward, showing there's no shame in putting ghosts to rest. -- Patty Wetli, Boolist
"Arresting, skillful, magical. Leavitt's wonderful narrative works as almost a parable for that complicated and uncertain era, teaching and warning her readers even as she entertains them."
Skip Horack, The San Francisco Chronicle
"An eminently satisfying read. Leavitt provides no easy answers about how we can compensate for loss, but she engages our heart."
Kathryn Lang, The Boston Globe
"Giving the book an "enthusiastic thumbs up," Wally Lamb credits Leavitt with a "Mad Men-like examination of shifting midcentury American values."
Mary Polis, MSN Entertainment Page Turner
“Riveting.” —Vanity Fair
“Taut and resonant mystery.”—Barnes & Noble Review
“Leavitt is a lovely writer and here she tells an absorbing story.”—New York Daily News
"Not only is [Leavitt] an incredibly accomplished novelist, she's also a crackerjack human being." —The Huffington Post
"Leavitt has a way of crafting the loveliest novels out of tragedy ... It's her examination of loss, grief, and disappointment that will engross readers." —Booklist
"This tale of domestic suspense builds to a shocking climax and will appeal to anyone immersed in suburban lore." —Library Journal
"When someone disappears, what happens to the people who are left behind? This is the central, heartbreaking question in Caroline Leavitt's exquisite new book. With characters so real they feel technicolor, a plot that beats like a racing pulse, and prose so lovely that sometimes I found myself repeating the words out loud, Is This Tomorrow is the novel you need to read today." --Jodi Picoult, New York Times bestselling author of The Storyteller and Lone Wolf
(Jodi Picoult)
"From the lockstep '50s into the do-your-own-thing '60s, Caroline Leavitt follows her cast of lonely characters as they grapple with the sorrowful mystery of a missing child. 'Are any of our children safe?' one asks, and of course the answer is no, no one is. Like Mona Simpson's Off Keck Road, Is This Tomorrow is an intimate meditation on time, loss and destiny."
Stewart O'Nan, author of Emily, Alone and The Odds
"In the spirit of Richard Yates' novel Revolutionary Road, Caroline Leavitt peels back the neat façade of suburban life in the 1950s to uncover the ways in which the demands of conformity leave a trail of loneliness and pain for those who lie outside its bounds. Ava Lark, the divorced Jewish mother of twelve-year-old Lewis, struggles against the judgment of neighbors as she and her son befriend the only other fatherless children around, Jimmy and Rose. Jimmy's sudden, unexplained disappearance taps into every parent's worst nightmare. Blending taut suspense with deeply moving portrayals of fierce parental love, childhood friendships and first crushes, Leavitt has created a novel with haunting characters and much to say about how we move through tragedy. "
Libby Cowles, Maria's Bookshop
"When someone disappears, what happens to the people who are left behind? This is the central, heartbreaking question in Caroline Leavitt's exquisite new book. With characters so real they feel technicolor, a plot that beats like a racing pulse, and prose so lovely that sometimes I found myself repeating the words out loud, Is This Tomorrow is the novel you need to read today."
Jodi Picoult, New York Times bestselling author of The Storyteller and Lone Wolf
"A beautiful free-spirited divorcee is shunned by her neighbors. A boy from that neighborhood goes missing. This is the engine that drives Leavitt's latest story, a page turner from first to last. I loved the way Leavitt's Mad Men-like examination of shifting American values dovetails with her vivid tale of heartbreak and hope. An enthusiastic thumbs-up from this grateful reader."
Wally Lamb, author of The Hour I First Believed, I Know This Much is True, She's Come Undone
"Leavitt's first historical novel is a grand slam. Her attention to detail and dialogue are remarkable. The ratcheting tension as an Eisenhower era neighorhood searches for a missing boy-gripping. The resolution of the mystery years later, both heartbreaking and hopeful. I so admire Leavitt's ability to pull you into the story, tie you up, and leave you guessing, until she masterfully guides you through the twists and turns towards, home. "
Lesley Kagan, author of Good Graces
"Leavitt asks the big, equivocal questions: What does it mean to be a mother, a family? What is the nature of identity? The answers will provoke you, frustrate you, rearrange your heart."
Jacquelyn Mitchard, author of The Deep End of the Ocean and What We Saw At Night
"An expertly rendered novel that poignantly chronicles the aftermath of a family's worst nightmare and its far-reaching devastation. At once haunting and elegant, Is This Tomorrow will leave the reader shattered and hopeful right up to the shocking end."
Heather Gudenkauf, author of The Weight of Silence
"Is This Tomorrow is the gripping tale of a boy gone missing in 1950s suburbs and of of those whose lives are enveloped, tangled and changed by the mystery: the missing boy's sister, his best friend, and the divorced working mom who can't fit into the neighborhood. With wit and a perfect eye into the human heart, Leavitt has given us a truly unique story of love, loyalty, loss, betrayal, secrets, healing--and a resolution you'll never see coming. It's everything you want in a novel."
Sue Monk Kidd, author of The Secret Life of Bees
"In her dynamic follow-up to Pictures of You, Leavitt has given us that rare and irresistible combination of tenderly crafted, richly layered and utterly believable characters I found myself caring about by page ten--and a crackling suspense story that just about explodes off the page. Call it a literary thriller: Is This Tomorrow reveals a world you will want to linger in, and secrets you'll stay up late to untangle. Reading this story is a memorable and moving journey and one that (for those who don't already love her work) reveals Leavitt to be a brave and humane writer who also understands what keeps us turning the pages."
Joyce Maynard, author of The Good Daughters and Labor Day
"When a 12-year-old boy disappears from his suburban Boston neighborhood, ripples spread far and wide. It's the rigid 1950's and a tight knit community comes undone. The mystery is set up early in the novel, so there is plenty of time to get involved and invested in characters you care about, or are distrustful of, or ones whose motives you question. The overwhelming arc of the story is for these characters you come to feel protective of to get beyond the tragedy. How can you get to tomorrow when time is forever stuck on one tragic day? You want them to find their tomorrows. And thanks to great writing, I was pulling for them all the way."
Candace Purdom, Anderson's Bookshop
" Caroline Leavitt writes and weaves like poetry into the lives of this book."
Amal Chaaban, RagMag Magazine
ENJOYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!
And Blessed Are The Ones Who Care For Their Fellow Men!
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