Whiteout

American expatriate Paul Bauer, a freelance journalist living in Paris with his French lover, thinks he has it made. And then his mother dies. When he returns for the funeral to a little town in northern Minnesota, he encounters unsettling contradictions to his understanding of his family history and begins a quest into his past that leads him back among the dead. He hears the voices of his parents talking of dreams, desires, and loss, and inexorably their story leads him to ask the question—the very question his family has always wanted to prevent him from asking: What really did happen in that whiteout thirty-five years ago? The answer changes everything.

PRAISE FOR WHITEOUT

Whiteout won the Independent Publisher Gold Medal for Midwestern Fiction in 2010.  

“‘Whiteout’ is a stunning debut novel, worthy of national recognition. . . .[It] is as well-written, suspenseful and exciting as any novel I’ve read lately from any New York publishing house. . .”

- Mary Ann Grossman, St. Paul Pioneer Press (Read full article HERE)

“Whiteout is an intense, moving story about how lost a family can get and how it can right itself again. The atmosphere of the north woods permeates the novel and gives it a deep claustrophobic, gothic sense. Duren takes the metaphor of the whiteout—the complete blankness of the world, the possibility of erasing everything—and shows that it is not the answer. Instead, in this lovely, lyrically written novel, he gives us the power of the truth.”

- Mary Logue, Winner of the Minnesota Book Award for Fiction

“This chilly and disturbing novel set in the freezing wilds of Minnesota will be hard to forget. Duren has a real talent for describing a rugged and unforgiving wilderness that he loves.”

- Kathy Perschmann, Armchair Interviews

“Brian Duren’s debut novel Whiteout is a remarkable first work.”

- Andrea Coventry, Bookpleasures.com

“[The] layers [of meaning in “Whiteout”] are cold and white, and potentially deadly. The perfect book for a cold winter’s day, curled up in a blanket, with big flakes falling silently outside. 

- Jana Peterson, Duluth News Tribune

Book dealers may order Whiteout  from Itasca Books Distribution, Ingram, or Baker & Taylor