A Matter of Mercy

A Novel

by Lynne Hugo

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Pub Date Aug 01 2014 | Archive Date Oct 06 2014

Blank Slate Press

General Fiction (Adult) | Women's Fiction

Description

Caroline Marcum thought she'd escaped the great mistake of her life by leaving Wellfleet harbor, but is forced to face it when she returns, reluctantly, to care for her dying mother. Ridley Neal put his past-and his prison term-behind him to return home to take over his father's oyster and clam beds. Casual acquaintances long ago, when a nor'easter hits the coast, Rid and Caroline's lives intersect once again. When Rid and two other sea farmers are sued by the wealthy owners of vacation homes who want to shut them down, and Caroline accidentally meets the person she most wronged, they each must learn to trust-and love. Inspired by a 1996 lawsuit, A Matter of Mercy is a riveting novel about treasuring the traditional way of life in the shallows of beautiful Cape Cod bay by discovering where forgiveness ends and where it begins.

A Note From the Publisher

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Lynne Hugo is a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship recipient who has also received grants from the Ohio Arts Council and the Kentucky Foundation for Women. She has published five previous novels, one of which became a Lifetime Original Movie of the Month, two books of poetry, and a children’s book. Her memoir, Where The Trail Grows Faint, won the Riverteeth Literary Nonfiction Book Prize. Born and educated in New England, she and her husband currently live in Ohio with a yellow Lab feared by squirrels in a three state area.

Ms. Hugo has taught creative writing to hundreds of schoolchildren through the Ohio Arts Council’s renowned Arts in Education program. She holds a Bachelor’s degree from Connecticut College, and a Master’s from Miami University.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Lynne Hugo is a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship recipient who has also received grants from the Ohio Arts Council and the Kentucky Foundation for Women. She has...

Advance Praise

"A richly detailed, intimate look at the struggles of love and hard work and hard choices. With wisdom and compassion, Lynne Hugo explores how we sometimes find our homes in the places and people we've left behind. This book draws you in and won't let you go. A Matter of Mercy is the kind of novel one longs to read - beautifully written, full of crooked fates, terrible loss and hard-won second chances."
-Laura Harrington, author of Alice Bliss, winner of Massachusetts Book Award for Fiction

"Lynne Hugo's novel A MATTER OF MERCY is full of intrigue and heart, as gritty as the inside of a clamshell and tender as a beach sunset. You won't soon forget this story of two Cape Cod residents struggling against the tides for mercy and reaching out for each other despite the dark currents of their own pasts."
-Jenna Blum, New York Times and internationally bestselling author of THOSE WHO SAVE US, THE STORMCHASERS, and "The Lucky One" in GRAND CENTRAL.

"Through her exquisite use of language and deft storytelling, Lynne Hugo has rendered a universe so precise it sings of truth and so human it plucks at all the right strings. She is that rare fiction writer who truly understands the music of good writing, conflating the worlds of prose and poetry into something exalted, a symphony for both the heart and the ear." - Kim Triedman, author of The Other Room

"A richly detailed, intimate look at the struggles of love and hard work and hard choices. With wisdom and compassion, Lynne Hugo explores how we sometimes find our homes in the places and people...