Demon Copperhead meets Les Choristes in this tender coming-of-age story, told through the intersecting lives of a group of troubled boys in a home for 'delinquent' young men in the American south in the 1980s

'A rare, brilliant, generous, bighearted book that mines hope from the darkest and most difficult human experiences' Gabriel Tallent, author of My Absolute Darling

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They are outcasts, runaways, delinquents. They've roamed the streets, stolen cars and dealt dope. They've hurt people; people have hurt them. Their futures promise dead end jobs, prison, or worse. But for now they've been brought together to live in an old house on a hill, to see about getting themselves - and each other - right.
These are the boys of Hope House, an institution for troubled young men in 1980s Kentucky. They're boys who are coming of age into a society which has already closed its doors; boys who have never had families but who yearn to belong; boys with big dreams and beating hearts beneath their scars. And here at Hope House, as they grapple with their pasts and lift each other up, they might just manage to turn everything around.
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'A stunningly beautiful debut; a novel of life on the margins, written with style and grace, and populated with characters that stay with you long after the final page' Tom Newlands, author of Only Here, Only Now

'This beautifully told novel, heartbreaking and heart-healing, illuminates what it means to call a place home' Kim Edwards, author of The Memory Keeper's Daughter

'A beautiful novel of such tender frankness, building the lives of this group of kids with bottomless care and a fiercely keen eye for detail and movement' Aimee Bender, author of The Butterfly Lampshade

LONGLISTED FOR THE CENTER FOR FICTION 2026 FIRST NOVEL PRIZE