The Barrowfields by Phillip Lewis

I am a sucker for a book about books, authors, and libraries. Throw in a hauntingly eerie home perched on the side of a mountain, a modern structure made of iron and glass that sits above a hard-scrabble town in the Appalachians and I am hooked. The Barrowfields was that and more. A beautifully written story of a man who leaves his home in the Appalachian Mountains to attend college and write the great American novel only to return with a pregnant wife and his unfinished tome. He moves his family into the magnificent house on the hill where he continues to work on his obsession in the extensive library that Phillip Lewis writes as a supporting character in The Barrowfields. This family saga is told to us by his son Henry, who along with his sister Threnody, grows up in this rambling home in awe of their brilliant father and cared for by their beautiful and carefree mother until a family tragedy occurs that changes the trajectory of all their lives. Son Henry leaves home, as his father did, only to return after earning a law degree, as his father did, to solve the mystery of the family and to return to the home and sister he abandoned. This was a beautifully lyrical debut that will leave you wanting more from Phillip Lewis.