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Book Summary and Reviews of More News Tomorrow by Susan Richards Shreve

More News Tomorrow by Susan Richards Shreve

More News Tomorrow

A Novel

by Susan Richards Shreve

  • Critics' Consensus (1):
  • Readers' Rating (29):
  • Published:
  • Jun 2019, 208 pages
  • Rate this book

About this book

Book Summary

A thrilling and richly drawn family drama about a daughter's quest to understand her mother's mysterious death.

On the morning of her seventieth birthday, Georgianna Grove receives an unexpected letter that calls her back to Missing Lake, Wisconsin, where her mother was murdered sixty-six years earlier. Georgie's father had confessed to the murder the next morning and was carted off to a state penitentiary. Haunted by the night that took both her parents away and determined to unearth the truth, Georgie takes her reluctant family on what will become a dangerous canoe trip up the swollen Bone River to return to Missing Lake.

Acclaimed novelist Susan Richards Shreve, celebrated for her "refined explorations of parent-child relationships" (Washington Post), captures the tenor of the times with clarity and elegance as she follows both Georgie and her parents on parallel trips up the Bone River, weaving together the hope of June 2008 with the injustices of June 1941. Georgie must untangle a web of bigotry, loss, and half-forgotten memories to finally understand her parents' fate.

More News Tomorrow is a stirring and irresistible portrait of a family drawn together in search of truth.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"Part gothic novel, part adventure story, but primarily a meditation on surmounting misfortunes that may lie beyond an individual's control." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"With a keen sense of place and pacing, Shreve weaves a subtle but unrelenting pattern of malevolence in this portrait of a woman burdened by the sins of her father and sustained by her unshakable belief in his innocence." - Booklist

"In this enormously varied and yet tied-together book, Shreve has written a story of multi-generations―the great mysteries surrounding the things we know and the things we don't know, and she has done this with a prose that is intriguingly delicate and yet strong at the same time; More News Tomorrow is one of her very best books." - Elizabeth Strout, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Olive Kitteridge and Anything Is Possible

"In More News Tomorrow, Susan Richards Shreve gives us an unforgettable seventy-year-old heroine, Georgianna Grove, who takes her family and the reader on a journey back in time to solve the murder of her mother. Part mystery, part family drama, More News Tomorrow reveals the hatred of racism, the weight of history and grief, and the enormous generosity and grace of the human heart. I loved this book!" - Ann Hood, best-selling author of The Book That Matters Most

This information about More News Tomorrow was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Reader Reviews

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Gary R. (Bolingbrook, IL)

The river
What a great read,having never read the author before I took a chance on reading someone new to me and very glad l did! Without giving anything away this is the story of Georgie, who at 70 years old received a letter from the only person still alive that was present when her mother was murdered, supposedly by her father. She gathers up her family to take a canoe trip back to the camp where the murder occurred. Part mystery, part adventure, part family drama, all around good read! Great characterizations, it'll keep you up to late! Get it, you'll love it, I did!

Beverly D. (Palm Harbor, FL)

A Gem
I really liked this book. A generational murder mystery that needs to be solved for the 70 year old protagonist Georgie. But the drama surrounding the current generation almost overtakes the original murder. There were multiple narrators but I found it easy to follow and felt that Ms. Shreve's key characters were well developed. This is a GREAT book club title. I will suggest it to my reading friends.

Sylvia T. (Rancho Mirage, CA)

More News Tomorrow
On her 70th birthday, Georgianna receives a letter from the only other person from the 1941 canoe trip who's still alive. At the time, Roosevelt McCrary was an 11-year-old child who had been hired, along with his mother, to work at the camp despite being black. As an adult, Roosevelt became a part owner of the camp and has retired there. Hoping he has information to exonerate William, Georgianna decides to revisit the camp and nearby murder site for the first time. She drags along her family—grown children Venus, Rosie, and Nicolas, whose work on Barack Obama's campaign hovers in the background; Rosie's 13-year-old son, Thomas, in the throes of grieving his own father's recent death; Nicolas' son, 15-year-old Jesse, and 4-year-old daughter, Oona, coincidentally Georgianna's age in 1941. Georgianna discovers that her parents' lives and deaths were more complex and mysterious than she thought and not truly knowable. I especially liked the story line/ relationship Shreve developed between Georgianna and her grandson, Thomas. I could not put this book down once I started it. It's a real page turner!

Maureen S. (Huntington Station, NY)

More News Tomorrow
More News Tomorrow is a fast read because you will not be able to put it down. It has everything a reader wants: beautiful language, mystery, suspense, and unforgettable characters. The book takes us on two journeys in time. Georgiana's trip in 2008 and her parent's trip in 1941. Georgiana is haunted by the murder of her mother and her father's confession to the murder. As an anthropologist, Georgie believes her ability to research and discover the facts will help her solve this mystery. Instead it leads her and her family on a dangerous trip up the Bone River.
Susan Richard Shreve has given us a story of love, hate, racism, antisemitism and family relationships. There is much to think about and to discuss in this novel.

Laura G. (Buffalo, NY)

More News Tomorrow
More News Tomorrow was a quick read. 70 year old Georgie receives a letter from Roosevelt, a man she only knows through a news article about the murder of her mother and her father's subsequent murder charge. Her father dies in jail after telling her "more news tomorrow" leaving Georgie to wonder what that news would have been. She hopes Roosevelt will provide the answers to this mystery. Her plan to meet Roosevelt leads Georgie's whole family to take a trip that will intrigue every reader. My favorite part of this book was the character development as the canoe trip unfolds. There are many interesting characters on the canoe both at the time the book was written and the time of the murder.

Nancy D. (Raleigh, NC)

A Family Story
The beginning of the book was a little tedious as the family members and the dynamics between them were introduced. Once the family started their camping trip the real adventure began. The story of William and Josephine was intriguing. I found myself trying to figure out what actually happened and why. The dialog between Georgie and Thomas is very thought provoking and caring. The budding relationship with Roosevelt and the adventures at the camp make this a good read. It is a good story about a strong, but different, family and the meaning of sticking together.

...23 more reader reviews

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Author Information

Susan Richards Shreve Author Biography

Photo: David Carmack/carmackphoto.com

Susan Richards Shreve is the author of fifteen novels, a memoir, and thirty books for children. She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship and a National Endowment grant, among other honors. A professor of creative writing at George Mason University and former chairman of the PEN/Faulkner Foundation, Shreve lives in Washington, D.C.

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