summary of ordinary grace by william kent krueger

Like any small town, secrets are bubbling just below the surface. The town's characters feel familiar too, believable enough without being cliched. The rural setting feels comfortable, with its rolling river and oppressive heat. It’s a book with a strong sense of time and place and helps to put the reader right in the center of the story. There is a race element to the book, and it made me think of another author, Louise Erdrich. There are also similarities in the way that William Kent Krueger depicts small-town America, and I don’t make that comparison lightly as King is one of the best around at depicting places like this and the characters that inhabit it.Īnother book that came to mind was ‘ To kill a mockingbird' just in terms of the narrator Frank and the coming of age aspect of the story, and how his father was well respected in the town, this time as the local pastor. One of the first things that came to mind when reading ‘ordinary grace’ was the Stephen King short story/film ‘Stand by me.’ It’s the death of the child on the first page of the book and then another incident that takes place a little while later. Frank is looking back at these events forty years later.

More death is to follow, in a summer that will change lives in the small town forever. In ‘Ordinary grace’ by William Kent Krueger, Frank Drumm is 13 years old and lives in New Bremen, Minnesota where it’s summertime, a summer that begins with the death of a child on railroad tracks outside the town.

Summary of ordinary grace by william kent krueger