Crow Lake

Description: For the farming Pye family of northern Ontario, life is a Greek tragedy where the sins of the fathers are visited on the sons, and terrible events occur offstage. In this universal drama of family love and misunderstandings, Lawson ratchets up the tension with heartbreaking humor and consummate control.

Review Quotes: "A finely crafted debut ... conveys an astonishing intensity of emotion, almost Proustian in its sense of loss and regret."--Kirkus Reviews, starred review

"The assurance with which Mary Lawson handles both reflection and violence makes her a writer to read and watch ... has a resonance at once witty and poignant."--New York Times Book Review

"Crow Lake is the kind of book that keeps you reading well past midnight; you grieve when it's over. Then you start pressing it on friends."--Washington Post Book World

"A touching meditation on the power of loyalty and loss, on the ways in which we pay our debts and settle old scores, and on what it means to love, to accept, to succeed--and to negotiate fate's obstacle courses."--People

"Lawson's tight focus on the emotional and moral effects of a drastic turn of events on a small human group has its closest contemporary analogue in the novels of Ian McEwan."--Toronto Star