Shepard's novel "opens with a man in his house at dawn, surrounded by aspens, coyotes cackling in the distance as he quietly navigates the distance between present and past. More and more, memory is overtaking him: in his mind he sees himself in a movie-set trailer, his young face staring back at him in a mirror surrounded by light bulbs. In his dreams and in visions he sees his late father -- sometimes in miniature, sometimes flying planes, sometimes...

In Holt, Colorado, widower Louis Waters is initially thrown when the widowed Addie Moore suggests that they spend time together, in bed, to stave off loneliness. "No, not sex," she clarifies. "I'm talking about getting through the night. And lying warm in bed, companionably." Her husband died years ago, as did his wife, and in such a small town they naturally have known of each other for decades; in fact, Addie was quite fond of Louis's wife. His...

"Jacob, a middle-aged architect living in Copenhagen, is in the alcohol-soaked throes of a bitter divorce when he receives an unexpected call from his great-uncle Anton, who is in his nineties and still lives with his brother Anders on their rural Jutland farm--a place Jacob hasn't visited since the summer of 1978. Anton asks Jacob to answer the question that has haunted them both for decades: What happened to Ellen? To find out, Jacob must revisit...