A Book A Week

I first learned about Téa Obreht around the time I started my blog in 2012. Her debut, The Tiger's Wife, was taking the reading world by storm, and I quickly bought a copy to see what all the fuss was about. In typical fashion, though, I never actually read it. In fact, that very copy still sits unread on my bookshelf today.

It wasn't until a couple of years ago that I finally read my first Obreht novel, and no, it wasn't The Tiger's Wife. Instead, I picked up The Morningside. While I appreciated Obreht's writing and her ambition in tackling complex themes, I came away feeling more mixed than I'd hoped. So this week, I decided to give her work another try with Sunrise, her latest novel. Maybe this would finally be the book that showed me what I'd been missing all these years.

The novel follows three people separated by more than a century, their stories connected by one place.

In 2024, Nina finds herself stranded somewhere in the mountains of Wyoming after the small plane she was traveling in crashes into a lake. Her boyfriend, Ben, was piloting the plane, but he's nowhere to be found. Alone in the wilderness with a dying cell phone, no service, and only a handful of protein bars, Nina must figure out how to survive. Then she stumbles upon a literal ghost town, and the story jumps back in time.

It's 2003, and Coll is helping prepare the town for its annual historical reenactment. But as he works to bring the past to life, questions begin to emerge about the history they've been celebrating. The town's founding story, and the hero at the center of it, may not be quite as heroic as everyone has been led to believe.

Then we travel all the way back to 1902. Sunrise's founder, gunslinger Anton Vargas, has returned home after years away. His timing proves significant as a young boy goes missing, and Anton joins the search. But as suspicion spreads through the town, people begin to wonder why Anton returned when he did and what, if anything, he knows about the boy's disappearance.

As with her previous novel, Téa Obreht imbues every page of Sunrise with a vivid sense of place. Based on the two books I've read by her, this is clearly one of her greatest strengths. Here, she transports us through time, giving each era its own distinct identity even as the physical setting remains largely the same. I'll admit to feeling a bit discombobulated at first. I had really latched onto Nina's story when the novel suddenly jumped back to Coll's. Still, as the book's true nature began to reveal itself, I grew increasingly curious about where Obreht was ultimately taking us.

The pacing can be uneven, especially toward the end, but what Sunrise occasionally lacks in narrative momentum it makes up for in sheer ambition. I'm still probably more mixed on Obreht than I'd like to be, especially given the acclaim her work routinely receives. Maybe her novels and I simply operate on slightly different wavelengths. Still, I can't help but admire her ability to wrestle with complex ideas while creating settings that feel completely alive on the page. Sunrise didn't quite dazzle me in the way I'd hoped, but it certainly gave me plenty to think about after I finished reading.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

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