The Bird Saviors
by William J. Cobb
This title was previously available on NetGalley and is now archived.
Send NetGalley books directly to your Kindle or Kindle app
1
To read on a Kindle or Kindle app, please add kindle@netgalley.com as an approved email address to receive files in your Amazon account. Click here for step-by-step instructions.
2
Also find your Kindle email address within your Amazon account, and enter it here.
Pub Date Jun 12 2012 | Archive Date Sep 01 2012
Description
When a dust storm engulfs her Colorado town and pink snow blankets the streets, a heartbreaking decision faces Ruby Cole, a girl who counts birds. She must either abandon her baby or give in to her father, whom she nicknames Lord God, and marry a man more than twice her age who already has two wives. She chooses to run, which sets in motion an interlocking series of actions and reactions, upending the lives of an equestrian police officer, pawnshop riffraff, a disabled war vet, Nuisance Animal destroyers, and a grieving ornithologist who is studying the decline of bird populations. All the while, a growing criminal enterprise moves from cattle rustling to kidnapping to hijacking fuel tankers and murder as events spin out of control in a world in which the social fabric and economic structures seem on the verge of falling apart.
Set in a time of economic turmoil, virus fears, climate change, fundamentalist cults and illegal immigrant hardship, The Bird Saviors is a visionary story of defiance, anger, compassion and unexpected love, in which a young woman ultimately struggles to free herself from her domineering father, to raise her daughter in the chaos of the New West, and to seize an opportunity to become something greater herself. In this brilliant new novel, William Cobb offers an elemental and timely vision of resilience and personal survival, but-most of all-of honest hope.
"The Bird Saviors is a stark modern-day Old Testament story in which the evil that men do is barely balanced by the good that a few manage to achieve. It's a gritty harrowing story set in a dust-blown Colorado town that seems filled with vivid characters. Cobb's expert story-telling compels us forward scene by scene to a final satisfying redemption." -Kent Haruf, author of Plainsong
"A novel told
with an unexpected and appealing warmth; the characters in The Bird
Saviors become increasingly memorable, page by page, and the story pulled
me in without hullabaloo or fuss-- this is good, confident storytelling."
--Aimee Bender
Advance Praise
PRAISE FOR THE BIRD SAVIORS
"Bill Cobb's The Bird Saviors is a stark modern-day Old Testament story in which the evil that men do is barely balanced by the good that a few manage to achieve. It's a gritty harrowing story set in a dust-blown Colorado town that seems filled with vivid characters. Cobb's expert story-telling compels us forward scene by scene to a final satisfying redemption."-Kent Haruf
"A novel told with an
unexpected and appealing warmth; the characters in The Bird Saviors become increasingly
memorable, page by page, and the story pulled me in without hullabaloo or
fuss-- this is good, confident storytelling."-Aimee
Bender
PRAISE FOR GOODNIGHT, TEXAS
"It's a gratifying thing to see a writer put warmth, lyricism, love of place, and a deeply observant naturalism to use as beautifully as William Cobb does in "Goodnight, Texas." The result, for me anyway, was to a renewed love of the things and people of this world -- a working definition of a wonderful book."-George Saunders
"Cobb (The Fire Eaters)
deals with the underlying issues of the destructiveness of nature and the
ultimate redemption of humankind. Superbly written, dark and amusing, Cobb's
portrait of this small town on the edge of disaster will stay with one long
after the last page is turned. Highly recommended."-Library Journal, starred review
"[A] not-to-be-missed story of remarkable beauty and power...Poignant and memorable."
-BookPage
"I don't know where William J. Cobb hangs out, but wherever that is he doesn't miss much. GOODNIGHT, TEXAS is full of sharply drawn, firmly created characters who come vibrantly alive in a ramshackle fishing village, with small, salty waves, a wide, watery vista, and a magically huge fish rotting on the shore. Cobb writes with surprising and wonderful insight into all sorts of folks, with concision and grace, in a voice rich with compassion, but no mush at all."-Daniel Woodrell
"Quirky and likable...charming."-Texas Monthly
"I think it eventually may well be considered as a masterpiece of American fiction and that William J. Cobb will join the ranks of our nation's best writers."-Curled Up With a Good Book.com
Available Editions
| ISBN | 9781609530709 |
| PRICE | |
