Etta and Otto and Russell and James by Emma Hooper

It’s a lovely book you’ll want to linger over” ( People). “In this haunting debut, set in a starkly beautiful landscape, Hooper delineates the stories of Etta and the men she loved (Otto and Russell) as they intertwine through youth and wartime and into old age. Moving from the hot and dry present of a quiet Canadian farm to a dusty, burnt past of hunger, war, and passion, from trying to remember to trying to forget, Etta and Otto and Russell and James is an astounding literary debut “of deep longing, for reinvention and self-discovery, as well as for the past and for love and for the boundless unknown” ( San Francisco Chronicle). Leaving his own farm will be the first act of defiance in his life. Russell insists on finding Etta, wherever she’s gone.

Meanwhile, their neighbor Russell has spent his whole life trying to keep up with Otto and loving Etta from afar. But with Etta gone, the memories come crowding in and Otto struggles to keep them at bay. Otto has seen the ocean, having crossed the Atlantic years ago to fight in a far-away war. “I will try to remember to come back,” Etta writes to her husband.

Otto wakes to a note left on the kitchen table. As Etta walks further toward the crashing waves, the lines among memory, illusion, and reality blur. So early one morning she takes a rifle, some chocolate, and her best boots and begins walking the 3,232 kilometers from rural Saskatchewan, Canada eastward to the sea. This “poetic, poignant” ( US Weekly) debut features last great adventures, unlikely heroes, and a “sweet, disarming story of lasting love” ( The New York Times Book Review).Įighty-three-year-old Etta has never seen the ocean.

Etta and Otto and Russell and James by Emma Hooper