Deserters - by Jerry Gabriel (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

An immersive adventure story set during the American Civil War follows four travelers as they escape toward the Western territories.

It is fall 1864, and Robert Riley has deserted his Army of the Potomac unit outside Petersburg, Virginia. Exhausted from years of war and worried about his motherless sons in Ohio, he returns to collect thirteen-year-old Michael and Sean, three years older, and flees to the Western territories. Along the way, he encounters Janey, an orphan at sixteen, who is also eager to go West. When Riley sees in her a quickness of mind, a brand of cunning that mirrors his own, he is persuaded to take her along.

Crossing the lower Midwest on horseback with little money and few possessions, the four are pursued by a wily private detective after the reward for turning in Riley. He manages to thwart the ragtag group, who abandon their plan of crossing the plains. They slip away by train to Chicago, and there, in that cold, stinking, dangerous metropolis, just before the 1864 election, they meet with problems beyond Riley's ability to resolve. All four find themselves alone, at the mercy of fortune . . . and the fortune hunter, who finally gets the chance to face down his nemesis.

Deserters alternates between the perspectives of the four major characters as their relationships grow and shift, and as each of them strives to forge their way forward in the late war's murky upheaval. A book whose antecedents include Charles Portis's True Grit and Paulette Jiles's News of the World, Gabriel's immersive novel is an adventure story with psychological intricacy, emotional intensity, and historical heft.

Review Quotes

"I am new to the work of Jerry Gabriel, and what a happy discovery. . . Jerry is a Maryland-based fiction writer, the author of two acclaimed short story collections and a fresh-off-the-press novel, Deserters, an adventure story set during the American Civil War that follows four travelers as they escape toward the Western territory."

-- "Lit Café with Kim Church"

"Deserters is a western unlike any I've read before--it's quiet, tender, propulsive, beautiful. This is a novel of transit, shot through with loneliness and solitary, unforgettable characters who will settle into your heart as they attempt their way west through a depleted, war-weary country."

--Ethan Rutherford, author of The Voyage of the Whaleship Esther

"I have waited impatiently for more work by Jerry Gabriel; his ability to write into the hearts and lives of memorable and gritty characters is unparalleled. Years later, his characters stay with me. His newest novel does not disappoint. Deserters is a portal into four scrappy individuals who push back against their historical time in rather astonishing ways. Escaping various wars, both personal and national, their lives become intertwined as they fight for their singular paths forward."

--Laura Pritchett, author of Hell's Bottom, Colorado

"Calm, deliberate, methodical: these adjectives describe not only the plot of Gabriel's latest, but also protagonist Robert Riley. Four years after the death of his wife and a year after enlisting with the Union, Robert is overcome with the desire to be with his teenage sons, Sean and Michael. He deserts his regiment in Virginia and begins the trek back to Ohio. Once there, he finds that Michael has befriended Janey Newsome, a teenager fleeing her own dark past. Meanwhile, Sean confirms that Robert is being hunted by Hark Carlide, a resourceful private detective on a dazzling horse. The four escape Carlide's grasp by slogging through the Midwestern countryside and labyrinthine slums of Chicago. Each character is equipped with survival skills: Robert and Janey, a shrewd efficiency at sizing up every nightmarish scenario; Sean, a stubborn dedication to fact; and Michael, the ability to draw people in and lay their kindness bare. Gabriel makes it clear that, with their bonds forged, the quartet's temporary dissolution doesn't diminish their genuine love for one another in this immersive Western adventure."

--Sarah Steers "Booklist"

About the Author

Jerry Gabriel is the author of two books of fiction, Drowned Boy and The Let Go. His first book, Drowned Boy, won the Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction and the Towson Prize for Literature. He lives in Maryland with his wife and children, where he teaches writing at St. Mary's College of Maryland.