Far Beyond the Gates by Philip Lee Williams

The chapters of this novel alternate between the voices of Lucy and Pratt. Both are divorced. Lucy is 35 and a high school English teacher. Pratt is her father and a history professor at UNC-Chapel Hill. His MS is making him aware of his mortality, and she he has invited his formerly estranged daughter to spend the summer with him at his second home in a gated community in the Smoky Mountains. She has accepted. Those gates are a symbol of what the two feel free to reveal and what they are holding within. "This book marries the power of Williams's prose with the beauty of his poetry. The result is a narrative full of enchanting characters, engaging dialogue, and sustained suspense whose imagery and insight resonate long after the final page--yet another jewel in Williams's lustrous literary career."--Heidi Lynn Nilsson. "This is a welcome addition to this writer's remarkable body of work."--Judson Mitcham. Herein lies a tale very much worth the telling, about the burden of cumbersome se