Excerpt from November Storm by Robert Oldshue, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"Looks like the Olneys are away," Doris said as they passed.

"What?"

"Paul and Sue. They usually have Thanksgiving with the Teetermans but the house is all dark and I haven't seen them today."

"Are the Teetermans people I'm supposed to know?"

"Don and Loretta."

"Never heard of them."

"They have a son named Jeff and a daughter named Tracy. Jeff was a year ahead of Dan, and Tracy was a year ahead of Tom, and Don and Loretta were in Parent's Forum."

"Everybody was in Parent's Forum."

After Royal, they turned onto Pine Crest and drove past the Sullivans' house, or former house. The Sullivans were an older couple; their children were grown by the time Doris and Ed had their three. Doris only knew they were the Sullivans because it said so on the wrought iron lamppost in their yard, and she'd only known that Mr. Sullivan had gone to a nursing home when she no longer saw him in the yard and that's what someone had said. After that the yard had been cut by someone Doris never saw until one day the sign was gone and there was a car she didn't know in the driveway, and, after that, when she drove by, Doris looked at the house and looked away, as she did now but only after she'd noticed the yard and the driveway and the roof, noting that there wasn't any snow on the roof or on the roof of the next house, formerly the Weinbergers', or the next house, formerly the Ginns'. Then they turned onto Indian Trail and the houses were bigger and older and there were fewer that she knew or had ever known, just the Isaacs' where there was nothing on the yard or

Excerpted from November Storm by Robert Oldshue. Copyright © 2016 by Robert Oldshue. Excerpted by permission of University of Iowa Press. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.