The Story of Edgar Sawtelle - Softcover

...the most enchanting debut novel of the summer. Written over a decade by the heretofore unknown David Wroblewski and arriving as a bolt from the blue, this is a great, big, mesmerizing read, audaciously envisioned as classic Americana...the voice heard in The Story of Edgar Sawtelle sounds like no one else s as this book creates its enthralling, warmly idiosyncratic story...One of the great pleasures of The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is its free-roaming, unhurried progress, enlivened by the author s inability to write anything but guilelessly captivating prose. (Janet Maslin, New York Times)

Whether you read for the beauty of language or for the intricacies of plot, you will easily fall in love with David Wroblewski s generous, almost transcendentally lovely debut novel, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. This is a tale set in rural Wisconsin in the first half of the 20th century, on a farm where the Sawtelles raise a fictional breed of dog. The dogs function like spirits in Shakespeare, or the chorus in Greek tragedy: They color the text with larger meaning yet remain tangibly real, deeply believable as dogs. Edgar is the mute boy who raises them, a mesmerizing fictional hero, primitive and wise. There are passages of language here ( A pair of does sprang over the fence on the north side of the field-two leaps each, nonchalant, long-sustained, falling earthward only as an afterthought... ) that make you pause and read again with luxuriant pleasure. Wroblewski s plot is dynamic - page by page compelling - and classical, evoking Hamlet, Antigone, Electra, and Orestes, as Edgar tries to avenge his father s death and his paternal uncle s new place in the affections of his mother. The scope of this book, its psychological insight and lyrical mastery, make it one of the best novels of the year, and a perfect, comforting joy of a book for summer. (O Magazine)

...here is a big-hearted novel you can fall into, get lost in and finally emerge from reluctantly, a little surprised that the real world went on spinning while you were absorbed. You haven t heard of the author. David Wroblewski is a 48-year-old software developer in Colorado, and this is his first novel. It s being released with the kind of hoopla once reserved for the publishing world s most established authors. No wonder: The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is an enormous but effortless read, trimmed down to the elements of a captivating story about a mute boy and his dogs. That sets off alarm bells, I know: Handicapped kids and pets can make a toxic mix of sentimentality. But Wroblewski writes with such grace and energy that Edgar Sawtelle never succumbs to that danger. Inspired improbably by the plot of Shakespeare s Hamlet, this Midwestern tale manages to be both tender and suspenseful...Most of the story comes to us through a masterful, transparent voice: The author, the narrator, the pages -- everything fades away as we re drawn into this engrossing tale....The final section gathers like a furious storm of hope and retribution that brings young Edgar to a destiny he doesn t deserve but never resists. It s a devastating finale, shocking though foretold, that transforms the story of this little family into something grand and unforgettable. (Washington Post Book World)

The New York Times instant bestseller and critically-acclaimed STORY OF EDGAR SAWTELLE by David Wroblewski: The most enchanting debut novel of the summer...a mesmerizing read, audaciously envisioned as classic Americana (Janet Maslin, New York Times)--now the 62nd selection of the Oprah Book Club.
Born mute, speaking only in sign, Edgar Sawtelle leads an idyllic life with his parents on their farm in remote northern Wisconsin. For generations, the Sawtelles have raised and trained a fictional breed of dog whose thoughtful companionship is epitomized by Almondine, Edgar s lifelong friend and ally. But with the unexpected return of Claude, Edgar s paternal uncle, turmoil consumes the Sawtelles once peaceful home. When tragedy strikes, Claude insinuates himself into the life of the farm--and into Edgar s mother s affections.

Forced to flee into the vast wilderness lying beyond the farm, Edgar comes of age in the wild, fighting for his survival and that of the three yearling dogs who follow him. But his need to face the mysteries he s left behind and his devotion to the Sawtelle dogs turn Edgar ever homeward.

David Wroblewski is a master storyteller, and his breathtaking scenes--the elemental north woods, the sweep of seasons, an iconic American barn, a fateful vision rendered in the falling rain--create a riveting family saga, a brilliant exploration of the limits of language, and a compulsively readable modern classic.