Gone So Long: A Novel

Andre Dubus III probes the limits of recovery and absolution in this masterpiece of empathy.

An ex- con who did time for murder, the estranged daughter he hasn’t seen in forty years, and the grandmother angry enough to kill him all come together in this riveting family drama. Like Dubus’s already- classic memoir, Townie, and his novel House of Sand and Fog (a #1 New York Timesbestseller), Gone So Long is a profound exploration of the struggle between the selves we wish to be, and the ones shaped by chance and circumstance, as well as character that we can’t escape.

Full of ghosts and regrets and glimmering shards of excavated memory, Gone So Long is about destruction and redemption and the stupid, stubborn way people have of squandering love.

Boston Globe

A multilayered character study, told in flashbacks and memoir excerpts and present- day prose, slowly revealing the strength and resilience of its two main female characters and ending with a hint of hope.
Rob Merill, Associated Press