The Shadows We Hide - Hardcover

"A brilliant sequel full of deeply developed characters... Eskens keeps readers guessing until the last pages in this darkly lyrical and brutally intimate story of one man's journey of self-discovery."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"A rewarding sequel . . . The Shadows We Hide completes a one-two gut punch that was well worth the wait."--Ginny Greene, Minneapolis Star-Tribune

"The Shadows We Hide is a riveting novel about one man's search for his father that becomes a perilous journey into a labyrinth of deceit and lies. Eskens vividly renders how small towns try to keep their secrets, and how sometimes they cannot."--Ron Rash, author of Serena

"Whether you like mysteries with surprise endings and terrific twists or you are a reader who never reads a mystery, but loves literary novels that explore the emotions that bring families together or tear them apart, you will want to read Allen Eskens's excellent novel, The Shadows We Hide."--Phillip Margolin, New York Times bestselling author of The Third Victim

"Riveting...Readers will enjoy trying to untangle all the clues."--Pioneer Press

"Murder, arson, betrayal, and reconciliation will keep pages turning and leave readers eager for more of Joe Talbert."--Booklist

"Talbert proves himself a true hero."--New York Times Book Review

FINALIST -- MINNESOTA BOOK AWARD, BEST GENRE NOVELFINALIST -- BARRY AWARD, BEST NOVEL

"The search for the father is a favorite theme of authors and one that is perfectly suited to the detective story form. Allen Eskens has drawn an intricate and intriguing search map full of sharp turns and returns. Suspenseful, revealing, clear-eyed, and brightly told, The Shadows We Hide is a real experience, page to page to end page."--Fred Chappell, author of I Am One of You Forever

Journalist Joe Talbert investigates the murder of the father he never knew, and must reckon with his own family's past, in this "brilliant sequel" to the national bestseller The Life We Bury (Publishers Weekly).

MINNESOTA BOOK AWARD FINALISTBARRY AWARD FINALIST
Joe Talbert, Jr. has never once met his namesake. Now out of college, a cub reporter for the Associated Press in Minneapolis, he stumbles across a story describing the murder of a man named Joseph Talbert in a small town in southern Minnesota.
Full of curiosity about whether this man might be his father, Joe is shocked to find that none of the town's residents have much to say about the dead man-other than that his death was long overdue. Joe discovers that the dead man was a loathsome lowlife who cheated his neighbors, threatened his daughter, and squandered his wife's inheritance after she, too, passed away--an inheritance that may now be Joe's.
Mired in uncertainty and plagued by his own devastated relationship with his mother, who is seeking to get back into her son's life, Joe must put together the missing pieces of his family history -- before his quest for discovery threatens to put him in a grave of his own.