Explore our new BookBrowse Community Forum!

Book Summary and Reviews of A Hole in the Universe by Mary McGarry Morris

A Hole in the Universe by Mary McGarry Morris

A Hole in the Universe

by Mary McGarry Morris

  • Critics' Consensus:
  • Published:
  • Mar 2004, 384 pages
  • Rate this book

  • Buy This Book

About this book

Book Summary

In her stunning new novel, Morris introduces us to Gordon Loomis, who, after twenty-five years in jail for a senseless high school murder, cannot come to terms with the enormity of his crime and its violation of all that is good and right. A giant of a man, he has learned to preserve a polite low profile and meager expectations for his life. Pressed by his family to start over, he stubbornly refuses to leave his old home and neighborhood—now devastated by a quarter century of decline. A Hole in the Universe follows Gordon and the three women who care for him as they force him to confront real life.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

"The plot picks up pace toward the end, reaching a fevered pitch as Gordon faces new (and unfounded) accusations, and the novel comes to a redemptive but satisfying and believable conclusion." - Publishers Weekly.

"'The dead cannot forgive, and the living have no right,' Gordon thinks. But here, in this brilliant novel, in the rare, bright bits of hope, like glimmers of shiny coins on a dirty street, Morris shows us the possibility." - The Washington Post, Caroline Leavitt.

"Her empathy for Gordon and his supporting characters in this novel, her fifth, is palpable, leaving the reader in awe of her uncanny ability to capture and convey each personality's unique essence." - Booklist.

"What Morris does with Delores and Gordon is infinitely truer and more moving-until a final-chapter resolution that's almost insultingly phony. Morris has all the tools. But they need sharpening, and better raw material." - Kirkus Reviews.

This information about A Hole in the Universe 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.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Author Information

Mary McGarry Morris Author Biography

Photo: Author website

Mary McGarry Morris was born in Meriden, Connecticut in 1943 and raised in Rutland, Vermont with three younger brothers. She was educated at Mount Saint Joseph Academy in Rutland, the University of Vermont, and the University of Massachusetts.

Her first novel Vanished was published in 1988. It was nominated for the National Book Award and the PEN/Faulkner Award. A Dangerous Woman was published in 1991 and was chosen by Time magazine as one of the "Five Best Novels of the Year." It was made into a motion picture starring Debra Winger, Barbara Hershey, and Gabriel Byrne. Songs In Ordinary Time was published in 1995. Two years later, it was chosen as an Oprah's Book Club selection, which propelled it to the top of the New York Times bestsellers list for many weeks, as well as making ...

... Full Biography
Link to Mary McGarry Morris's Website

Other books by Mary McGarry Morris at BookBrowse
  • The Last Secret jacket

7 more...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

More Recommendations

Readers Also Browsed . . .

more literary fiction...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Top Picks

  • Book Jacket: Graveyard Shift
    Graveyard Shift
    by M. L. Rio
    Following the success of her debut novel, If We Were Villains, M. L. Rio's latest book is the quasi-...
  • Book Jacket: The Sisters K
    The Sisters K
    by Maureen Sun
    The Kim sisters—Minah, Sarah, and Esther—have just learned their father is dying of ...
  • Book Jacket: Linguaphile
    Linguaphile
    by Julie Sedivy
    From an infant's first attempts to connect with the world around them to the final words shared with...
  • Book Jacket
    The Rest of You
    by Maame Blue
    At the start of Maame Blue's The Rest of You, Whitney Appiah, a Ghanaian Londoner, is ringing in her...

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    Pony Confidential
    by Christina Lynch

    In this whimsical mystery, a grumpy pony must clear his beloved human's name from a murder accusation.

Who Said...

From the moment I picked your book up...

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

F the M

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.