Douglas Bauer’s profound and exquisitely written first novel quickly established him as one of America’s best new writers. This is the story of Ed and Ramona, high school lovers who married young. And when Ramona, seeing the ever-clearer reality of life with Ed, turns and walks away from her house, from her life, and from her small baby boy, Ed is stunned into a depth of uncomprehending rage. With a deer hunter’s patience and a maniacal precision, Ed gathers what he needs and, in the dark of early winter, leaves to find his wife.

This darkly poetic novel is imbued with the same tough and tender understanding of the emotional lives of real people that distinguishes Bauer’s subsequent novels, The Very Air and The Book of Famous Iowans.

Douglas Bauer is the author of several books, including What Happens Next? Matters of Life and Death (Iowa, 2013), Prairie City, Iowa: Three Seasons at Home (Iowa, 2008), The Stuff of Fiction: Advice on Craft, and three novels, Dexterity, The Very Air, and The Book of Famous Iowans. His edited works include Death by Pad Thai and Other Unforgettable Meals and Prime Times: Writers on Their Favorite TV Shows. He lives in Boston and teaches literature at Bennington College.