The News from the End of the World - by Emily Jeanne Miller (Paperback)

About the Book

A novel of the Lake family of Cape Cod and the misplaced guilt and decidedly bad decisions that threaten to tear them apart, along with the love and the abiding desire to do the right thing that binds them together

Book Synopsis

"This one's a winner." --People

Vance Lake is broke, jobless, and recently dumped. Taking refuge with his twin brother, Craig, on Cape Cod, he unwittingly finds himself in the middle of a crisis that would test even the most cohesive family, let alone the Lakes. Seventeen-year-old Amanda is pregnant. Craig is heartbroken and full of rage; his exasperated wife, Gina, is on the brink of an affair; and Amanda is indignant, ashamed, and very, very scared.
Told in alternating points of view by each member of this colorful New England clan, and infused with the quiet charm of the Cape in the off-season, The News from the End of the World follows one family into a crucible of pent-up resentments, old and new secrets, and memories long buried. Only by coming to terms with their pasts, as individuals and together, do they stand a chance of emerging intact.

"My favorite kind of book, bighearted and full of complicated flawed characters stumbling through love and life, making hard choices, making mistakes, and making the reader fall in love with every one of them. I loved this novel!" -- Ann Hood, author of The Book That Matters Most

"With wonderfully crafted characters and expert pacing, Miller has written the kind of narrative that readers crave: a beautifully written, hard-to-put-down story that will stay long after the book has been closed." -- Booklist

Review Quotes

"Is home the answer or the end of the road? A beautifully crafted, emotional portrait of a Cape Cod family whose teenage daughter may not be the only one out of options. The austere beauty of the off-season landscape seems to bring out hard truths and scour away secrets. I loved it." --Helen Simonson, author of Major Pettigrew's Last Stand and The Summer Before the War "The News from the End of the World is my favorite kind of book, bighearted and full of complicated flawed characters stumbling through love and life, making hard choices, making mistakes, and making the reader fall in love with every one of them. I loved this novel!" --Ann Hood, author of The Book that Matters Most "With wonderfully crafted characters and expert pacing, Miller has written the kind of narrative that readers crave: a beautifully written, hard-to put-down story that will stay with readers long after the book has been closed." --BOOKLIST "Immersive... The unique landscape of Cape Cod in the offseason sets the stage for Miller's poignant, fast-paced family drama. Told in alternating points of view, this gripping novel gets to the heart of the familial trust, independence, and the struggle to overcome the past in order to forge a happier future."--PUBLISHERS WEEKLY "In The News from the End of the World, Emily Jeanne Miller deftly shows how lifetimes can be contained in four days, how memories inhabit a place, and how returning home is always to confront oneself. The characters in this novel consistently surprised me; they find grace in quiet moments, forgiveness when least expected. And it's all so beautifully written that by the end I felt as if I had lived in this town my whole life, and could walk its haunted streets." --Peter Rock, author of My Abandonment "Emily Jeanne Miller's The News from the End of the World recalls Tolstoy's line that 'every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way, ' an idea less tragic than simply true; shared pain is what solders us. This is a book about the soldering of one family, about the love between brothers and sisters and fathers and daughters all written in heartbreaking, true and gorgeous prose." --Lea Carpenter, author of Eleven Days "Emily Jeanne Miller is a master storyteller. In her brilliant The News from the End of the World, she summons a way of seeing reminiscent of Virginia Woolf: the male characters are as vivid as the female, and as their stories unfold, you cannot look away. This moving and deeply satisfying novel weaves several stories over a New England weekend, without one false note. I will be thinking about the Lake family for a long time." --Robert Bausch, author of Far as the Eye Can See and A Hole in the Earth --

About the Author

EMILY JEANNE MILLER graduated from Princeton University and holds an MFA from the University of Florida. She has received fellowships from Yaddo, the MacDowell Colony, and the Sewanee Writers' Conference, and is the author of Brand New Human Being.