The Winter in Anna: A Novel

A young man, Eric, drops out of college and lucks into a job with a small-town newspaper where he meets Anna—a woman whose story will both haunt and inspire him for the rest of his life. Set in a remote North Dakota community in the last days before the Internet, The Winter in Anna unfolds around a romance that almost was, and a meditation on what constitutes a life well lived. In wistful, moving reflections, Eric looks back on his days with Anna and struggles to reconcile his memories with what he has since learned of her. The Winter in Anna is a stirring and thoughtful novel filled with moments of tenderness, even as it slowly reveals an unbearable tragedy at the heart of a quietly defiant life.

About the Author :
Reed Karaim is the author of If Men Were Angels, a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers selection. He lives in Tucson, Arizona, with his wife and daughter.

Review :
"A deceptively quiet novel that gradually gathers power around the themes of love, loss, memory, and the paramount importance of doing good work well. Gorgeous and affirming." "The Winter in Anna is filled with the secret knowledge I want out of a novel, particularly concerning the important subjects in life: love, pain, North Dakota, newspapers, small towns, family, loyalty, friendship, and regret. I could tell this book was good when reading it felt like a secret I was keeping from my family and from the world." "I couldn’t put down this wise tale—by turns bone-chilling, rollicking, bittersweet—of a young man’s stint at the sort of small-town newspaper that, sadly, has all but vanished. The Winter in Anna arrives via the journalist’s older self—husband, father—and is enriched and enlarged by his big-hearted musings on what he failed to understand in his youth and how that failure haunts him still." "Reed Karaim tells a ‘tribal and ancient story’ about how our early choices shape us… With exotic details of a state filled with fire and ice, The Winter in Anna shows who we often find impossible to forgive: our younger selves." "The Winter in Anna is a deeply affecting elegy. As I read, I slowly realized that Anna herself—so full of what Chekhov called ‘haunting pathos’—would be a heart-wrenching character, and she is. Karaim works a beautifully paced magic. I somehow heard, page by page, Bach’s Unaccompanied Cello suites drifting in through the North Dakota snow." "An atmospheric and beautifully written capsule of loss, regret, and moments of salvation." "[A] literary heart stopper." "Memorable… The Winter in Anna is both thoughtful and introspective, in the tradition of Pat Conroy and Ward Just." "Captivating... [W]onderfully crafted... a beautiful, touching novel." "A melancholy, earnest study of friendship."