Andrew Krivak charts a razor-fine line between war and peace, damnation and redemption, estrangement and love, and along the way gives us a gorgeously detailed portrait of an American family. Whether he’s writing about battle, the natural world, or the most private, searing matters of the heart, Krivak brings a rare mastery to the page, a synthesis of language and deep perception that delivers revelation after revelation. Like the Appearance of Horses is a major achievement.
— Ben Fountain, author of Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk and Devil Makes Three
Like the Appearance of Horses
Rooted in the small, mountain town of Dardan, Pennsylvania, where patriarch Jozef Vinich settled after surviving World War I, Like the Appearance of Horses immerses us in the intimate lives of a family whose fierce bonds have been shaped by the great conflicts of the past century. In spare, breathtaking prose, Andrew Krivak delivers a deeply compassionate story about three generations who built a new life in America, participated in the Romani resistance during World War II, survived Vietnamese POW camps, watched their children deploy to Iraq, and did everything they could to heal the wounds of war when the fighting was over.
Massachusetts Book Awards Longlist
American Booksellers Association Indie Next List for Reading Groups
Reading Group Choices “Top Picks” selection
Library Journal “Best Literary Fiction of the Year” selection
Washington Independent Review of Books “Favorite Books of the Year” selection
Saturday Evening Post “Hot Reads” selection
Shelf Unbound “Recommended Reading” selection
Literary Hub “New Books!” selection
Book Marks “Best Reviewed Books of the Week” selection
BookBrowse “Best Books Publishing This Week” selection
Center for the Book at the New Hampshire State Library “Book of the Week” selection
Denver Public Library “Book Buzz” selection
Paperback
- ISBN
- 9781954276314
Hardcover
- ISBN
- 9781954276130
Ebook
- ISBN
- 9781954276147
Andrew Krivak discusses his inspirations for Like the Appearance of Horses and the previous novels of the Dardan Trilogy at the Brooklyn Book Festival, in the Brodart “Tell Me More” series, with the Somerville Arts Council, Image, and Fiction Writers Review, and on Contemplify, Keen On, and WBUR Here & Now.
Preview Like the Appearance of Horses at Shelf Unbound and Literary Hub, and find rich resources for your book club discussions at Reading Group Choices.
Andrew Krivak is an award-winning writer whose books include The Bear, a National Endowment for the Arts Big Read selection, and the freestanding novels of the Dardan Trilogy: The Sojourn, a National Book Award finalist and winner of both the Chautauqua Prize and Dayton Literary Peace Prize; The Signal Flame, a Chautauqua Prize finalist; and Like the Appearance of Horses, a Library Journal “Best Book of the Year” and Indie Next List for Reading Groups selection. He is discussion facilitator with the Family Connections Center, New Hampshire Department of Corrections, and visiting lecturer on English at Harvard University. He lives in Somerville, Massachusetts and Jaffrey, New Hampshire.
visit author page »Praise for Like the Appearance of Horses
Krivak’s Homeric novel is at once intimate and sweeping, expanding an epic story set into motion in The Sojourn. Tenderly attentive to all that is given and taken by war, Like the Appearance of Horses is a graceful, heroic accomplishment that speaks to the costs of duty when violence is as constant as the Pennsylvania mountains that anchor and separate this indelible family we’ve come to know so personally.
— Asako Serizawa, author of Inheritors
Raises provocative questions about how we perceive and engage with the past and is a further testament to Krivak’s masterful abilities as a storyteller.
— WBUR
Forceful and absorbing.
— WOSU
Compelling and deftly crafted.
— Midwest Book Review
Read this! You’ll never be the same again.
— Linda Bond, Auntie’s Bookstore (Spokane, WA)
Oh my this novel is so gorgeous and moving. About matters of the heart, about war’s impact on not just nations but individuals over generations. About how families are knitted together and how they survive with heartbreak just around the corner. How solace can be found in nature. . . . This is one of those rare novels that quietly will not leave the reader alone and untouched. Just beautiful.
— Sheryl Cotleur, Copperfield’s Books (Northern California)