New York, NY: Random House (2001)

First Edition. Advanced Reader. Signed.

Fine in decorated wrapper.


Canin's first novel.

"Blue River" tells the story of two brothers: Lawrence, brilliant but seething with anger, and Edward, responsible but cautious to a fault. To their mother, and to the world, Lawrence was always the bad brother, Edward always the good one. Over the years Edward has been both sustained and haunted by this perception; now a successful opthalmologist in his early thirties, his life seems a bulwark against any thought that the truth might be more complicated. Then his brother, whom he hasn't seen in ten years, appears one morning on his doorstep, knocking on his conscience. Lawrence has become everything Edward is not-- a drifter, gambler, a man on the run. Sly and somehow menacing, Lawrence challenges Edwards beliefs about who he really is, forcing him to recall their tumultuous childhood and uncover a long-buried story of betrayal.