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A Novel
by Justin Deabler
Justin Deabler's Lone Stars follows the arc of four generations of a Texan family in a changing America.
Julian Warner, a father at last, wrestles with a question his husband posed: what will you tell our son about the people you came from, now that they're gone? Finding the answers takes Julian back in time to Eisenhower's immigration border raids, an epistolary love affair during the Vietnam War, crumbling marriages, queer migrations to Cambridge and New York, up to the disorienting polarization of Obama's second term. And in these answers lies a hope: that by uncloseting ourselves―as immigrants, smart women, gay people―we find power in empathy.
"Deabler's bighearted debut...proudly and emotionally defines what it means to be from the Lone Star State." ―Publishers Weekly
"A beautiful and well-paced book worth savoring." ―Portland Book Review
"A delight, sometimes a revelation... Lone Stars tells a universal story, as all good books do." ―Lone Star Literary Life
"At once epic and timely, Deabler's stunning multi-generational novel is... a complicated love song to Texas, and (I'll be honest) a tear-jerker. You won't be able to set this one down." ―Diana Spechler, author of Who by Fire and Skinny
"A wonderfully humane and honest novel about a complicated modern American family. This perfectly paced story builds on secrets, betrayals and unconditional love toward a big-hearted ending that may leave you in tears." ―Jim Lynch, author of Before the Wind
This information about Lone Stars 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.
Justin Deabler grew up in Houston. He dropped out of high school when he was fifteen, went to Simon's Rock College, and graduated from Harvard Law School. He is the General Counsel for the Queens Public Library. He lives in Brooklyn with his husband, son, and two cats. Lone Stars is his first novel.
My Darling Boy by John Dufresne
The story of of a man whose son collapses into addiction and vanishes into the chaotic netherworld of southern Florida.
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