Vendor
	Writers House Maja Nikolic
Original language
English
Categories
Crime & mystery fiction

THE CURRENT

Tim Johnston

An Indie Next Pick for February 2019 * One of Entertainment Weekly’s Most-Anticipated Books of 2019 * Amazon Spotlight Pick for January 2019 * One of The Saturday Post’s 10 Best Winter Reads

Tim Johnston, whose breakout debut Descent was called “astonishing,” “dazzling,” and “unforgettable” by critics, returns with THE CURRENT, a tour de force about the indelible impact of a crime on the lives of innocent people. In the dead of winter, outside a small Minnesota town, state troopers pull two young women and their car from the icy Black Root River. One is found downriver, drowned, while the other is found at the scene—half frozen, but alive. What happened was no accident, and news of the crime awakens the community’s memories of another young woman who lost her life in the same river ten years earlier, and whose killer may still live among

them. Determined to find answers, the surviving young woman soon realizes that she’s connected to the earlier unsolved case by more than just a river, and the deeper she plunges into her own investigation, the closer she comes to dangerous truths, and to the violence that simmers just below the surface of her hometown. Grief, suspicion, the innocent and the guilty—all stir to life in this cold northern place where a young woman can come home, but still not be safe. Propulsive and brilliantly plotted, THE CURRENT is a beautifully realized story about the fragility of life, the power of the past, and the need, always, to fight back.

Rights to Descent sold in Czech Republic: Mystery Press; France: Lattes; Italy: Neri Pozza; Japan: Shogakukan; Poland: Marginesy; Romania: Grup Media Litera.

Available products
Book Published 2019-01-22 by Algonquin Books

Comments

“Tim Johnston is the best thing to come along in crime fiction in years. With Descent and THE CURRENT he has already established himself as one of the best writers in the game, with an original voice that calls to mind the likes of Cormac McCarthy and Dennis Lehane but is entirely his own. With its beautiful prose, deeply emotional storytelling, and craftman’s eye for detail, THE CURRENT made me want to read slower, and write better.”
– Michael Koryta, New York Times bestselling author of How It Happened

“The novel is careful layer upon careful layer, as deceptively thick yet brutally delicate as winter ice itself. Johnston’s descriptions of people, places, grief, and loneliness are subtle and evocative; the minor plot about an aging dog becomes a rending portrait of the ravages of love. Indeed, for all its harsh observations about human nature, this novel has at its heart a strong belief that love, for all the pain it brings, is the one thing that truly saves us. An apt title that functions as a beautiful metaphor for all the secrets and emotions roiling beneath the surface of every human life.”

“Johnston’s masterful novel is worth lingering over—it soars above the constraints of a traditional thriller and pulls you deep into the secrets of a grief-stricken town.”