Morning Will Come - (New Chicago Classics) by Billy Lombardo (Paperback)

About the Book

"Alan and Audrey Taylor are raising three children and coping with the demands of busy careers when their eldest child, Isabel, on the verge of precocious womanhood, goes missing in the middle of the night. Thus begins this intimate portrait of a barely functioning family left to decipher the mysteries of how to go on in the aftermath of violence and loss."--Publisher's description.

Book Synopsis

Alan and Audrey Taylor are an ordinary married couple raising three children and coping with the demands of busy careers when the unthinkable happens: their eldest daughter, Isabel, on the verge of precocious womanhood, goes missing in the middle of the night. Thus begins this intimate portrait of a barely functioning family as Alan, Audrey and their two young sons are left to decipher the mysteries of how to go on living and loving--in the aftermath of violence and loss. A haunting, sometimes raw exploration of grief, Morning Will Come is also by turns humorous and sexy, exploring the bonds of brotherhood and the redemptive power of love.

Originally published as How to Hold a Woman by Dzanc Books in 2009, this revised edition is being published in 2020 by Tortoise Books as part of their New Chicago Classics series.

Review Quotes

"Billy Lombardo's exquisite first novel shows us a fractured family the only way it can accurately be shown-through a fractured lens. The sorrow and honesty of this wise book is almost unbearable, but it's literature's best kind of unbearable, build upon a foundation of generosity, heart, and masterful craft." - Patrick Somerville, author of The Cradle, (TV) Maniac, The Leftovers

"Billy Lombardo's Morning Will Come is one of the wisest books about loss and the numbness of grief I've ever read. A family faces the unbearable, and as readers we're taken to the edge of the abyss, surveying the emotional fallout. A smart and moving account of how people cope with every parent's nightmare, Lombardo's achievement is in arranging his narrative around the new unspeakable hole in the center of their lives, and deftly takes us through the heart-wrenching, heart-healing aftermath as the family stumbles past their bewilderment and grief to what lies beyond." - CJ Hribal, author of The Company Car and The Clouds in Memphis

"Billy Lombardo's Morning Will Come is these things: exquisitely written, real, painful, and true. His talent for depicting the nuances of marriage and family is extraordinary; reading this, one feels as though Alan, Audrey and the boys are your close friends, about whom you somehow know a little more than you should. His ear for dialogue is spot-on, and his understanding of the human heart is profound. This is simply a lovely, heartbreaking book." - Elizabeth Crane, author of You Must Be This Happy