Debut Novel Debuts New Local Talent
There’s a new book coming out in early August by a Madison author with a whole lot of potential and a big publishing house behind her to boot.
Susanna Daniel’s debut novel STILTSVILLE (Harper, Aug. 2010, $24.99) is a terrific summer read, and I hope she’ll introduce herself to the larger Madison audience at this fall’s Wisconsin Book Festival.
While the book is a real page-turner, I was almost unable to continue when it was revealed that the protagonist’s husband is diagnosed with the same debilitating disease my father-in-law died of a few years ago. Daniels describes the excruciating experience with such honesty and clarity that it jerked me back to the time when the illness consumed us night and day.
It was worth fighting through the tears to finish the story. Daniels is a real talent, and I’m happy she’s made Madison home. Maybe her next book will take place a little closer to her new home; that would be fun. This one is set in hot and steamy Miami, where the family’s Biscayne Bay stilthouse is the scene of Dennis and Frances’s first kiss, and in later years the beginning of the end of life as they know it.
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