A Passage Without Return
Once upon a time, a family moved to the edge of the woods in Alaska to be closer to the stars—so close, the father told his children, they could feel the heat.
As in all fairy tales, though, things take a dark turn in The Unpassing, Bay Area novelist Chia-Chia Lin’s compelling debut, which examines grief, love, and survival in the wake of tragedy.
In the opening pages, the narrator, 10-year-old Gavin, falls ill with meningitis. When space shuttle has exploded not long after liftoff—personal and national calamities that the Taiwanese immigrant family will grapple with in the months and decades to come.
