Peace Like a River

by Lief Enger

(Fiction, 2001)

The quiet 1960s midwestern life of the Land family – father Jeremiah, and children, Reuben, Davy and Swede – is upended when Davy kills two teenage boys who have come to harm the family. On the morning of his sentencing, Davy escapes from his cell and the Lands set out in search of him. Their search is at once a heroic quest, a tragedy, a love story, and a haunting meditation on the possibility of magic in the everyday world. The  2002 “Book Sense Book of the Year” award-winner for adult fiction (given annually to books considered "hidden treasures" by the American Booksellers Association) and the 2002 Alex Award winner for Best Fiction for Young Adults. 313 p.