Verwandte Artikel zu Angels Crest

Angels Crest - Hardcover

Schwartz, Leslie

 
9780385511858: Angels Crest
Hardcover
ISBN 10: 038551185X ISBN 13: 9780385511858
Verlag: Doubleday, 2004

Inhaltsangabe

When his beloved son is kidnapped from their California mountain community, Ethan Denton undertakes a devastating search, which is affected by a challenging blizzard, his ex-wife's painful past, a Jewish judge, a lesbian couple, and a blind minister.

Die Inhaltsangabe kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

LESLIE SCHWARTZ is the author of Jumping the Green, which won the James Jones Literary Society Award for Best First Novel. Her short stories have appeared in dozens of literary journals, and her nonfiction has been published in the Los Angeles Times, Shape, Self, and other magazines and newspapers. She teaches fiction writing at UCLA Extension and poetry to at-risk high school students through PEN in the Classroom. She is also a mentor for young writers through PEN’s Emerging Voices fellowship program. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and daughter.

Aus dem Klappentext

It only takes a moment for a life to change forever.

Ethan Denton is a lucky man. Most things have gone his way, and being granted full custody of Nate, his young son and North Star, has given him a near-perfect life. On a crisp winter morning just before the start of deer season, Ethan and Nate set off together to discover the beauties of the forest. As he parks the truck, Ethan spots a pair of magnificent bucks, and, eager to take a closer look, leaves Nate asleep in the car seat, a brief, impulsive decision any parent might make. When he returns only a few minutes later, the door of the truck is open and Nate is nowhere to be seen.

As an unexpected blizzard blankets the woods, Ethan searches for the missing three-year-old with the help of other townspeople: Ethan s ex-wife and his ex-best friend; an older Jewish judge, whose concern and involvement is colored by recent problems with his own son; a middle-aged lesbian couple; and others touched by the crisis. Nate s disappearance brings up past wounds for everyone, but also miraculously provides the chance for love and redemption as they struggle to make sense of the inexplicable.

ANGEL S CREST is a beautifully wrought work, a seamless blend of dramatic suspense and emotional truth.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Ethan



Ethan woke slowly. The metal scent of a storm in the air. His heart quickened at the marvel of his life. Me, he thought, and the word came and went like a flash of light.

He got out of bed and put on his jeans. On a pallet on the floor, Nate lay sleeping. Ethan stood for a moment and gazed at him. Since the day his son was born, Ethan had always thought of Nate as his North Star. Now, he bent down and pushed the hair back from Nate's forehead.

"C'mon buddy, time to go."

Nate stirred. Ethan didn't bother to change him out of his footie pajamas, he simply put a parka over him and picked him up. He knew, if need be, there was a pair of shoes in the truck.

"Balloon, daddy," Nate said, still half asleep.

Ethan bent down and picked up the now-deflated balloon from Nate's third birthday party the day before. Nate grabbed it and held onto it while Ethan shimmied into his coat, balancing Nate first in one arm, then the other. He was getting so big, almost too heavy to hold anymore.

Dawn was at least an hour away. It was cold but Ethan could feel the subtle warmth of the coming snowstorm. He knew by the fragrant scent in the air that the storm was close. It was early for snow--just the first of December--but Ethan could feel how it threatened, how monstrous it would be. He imagined the way the clouds had journeyed almost 400 miles from the coast along the jet stream, packing more and more power on their way here, to this place, on this day of his life.

He bundled his son into the car seat and started the truck, turning the heat on. As he pulled out of the driveway and drove down the dirt road to the main highway, Nate said, "Brother Powell says I need to go to church."

He said "brother" like "bruver." And the r was missing from "church." It killed Ethan, the way Nate talked, the things he came up with. Once he called a daddy longlegs a long-legged daddy and Ethan had to pick him up and hold him and kiss him after that.

Still, no matter how charmed, Ethan had to make an effort now to keep the asshole out of his voice. He never liked Brother Powell but he tried to make his tone smooth, without too much sentiment.

"We're going to church now, buddy."

"We're going to the woods, dad."

"Well a church doesn't have to have four walls and a door to be a church."

Ethan heard the edge in his voice. He wanted to go on but Nate had already lost interest and by the time they had driven a mile out of town toward the mountains, he had fallen back to sleep. Ethan drove up the winding, narrow roads, higher and higher. Darkness was giving way to a weak gloomy light. He thought of Nate at the Christian pre-school. He had no choice but to send him there. He would not lose the full custody he'd just won because he didn't like the church school mandated by the settlement. He didn't like church schools and things that were organized, like religion and politics. But Ethan chose his battles well. The woods could knock the Jesus out of anyone, if you went there enough. So that's what Ethan would do. Indoctrinate his son with the divinity of the forest.

Ethan wished the storm had waited another day. Or that hunting season really opened this morning. He knew, from years of hunting, that deer stuffed themselves with zeal before a storm. Though they were swift and intelligent animals, they were also lazy. Ethan had learned that they did not like to expend too much energy searching for food. That meant on a day like this, they'd be everywhere, eating along the game trails, gathering nervously in the valleys, seeking shelter against the cliff faces. Easy targets.

Eventually he made his way to the fire road that ended at the old Angels Crest trailhead. He loved this spot. He felt the anticipation inside him, like a tight wire holding him together. He wished he could hunt today, but he was not the sort to stoop to poaching. It went against his principles.

He let the engine idle and watched the forest. Very few people knew of this place. Very few people would undertake it. It was the hard way up to Angels Crest and Ethan knew that most hunters were too lazy and liked to drink too much to find the footing a place like this required. It was a beautiful spot, with woven carpets of arctic willow spreading out among the towering stands of pine and fir. In the distance, the tip of Angels Crest glowered above the clouds. He had never been up there in a storm. But he could well imagine the fury.

Almost immediately, he spotted a mature buck over the rise. He looked back at his son. This was what he had come here for, as he did almost every day, to show Nate the beauty of the woods, the wildlife, the sanctity of this place. But Nate was fast asleep. Ethan felt a twinge of regret but he didn't want to wake his boy. He turned back toward the woods and two more buck appeared over the ridge. He thought he would go have a quick look, track them for a minute. He promised himself he'd keep the truck in sight without venturing too far.

He turned off the engine, pocketed the keys and looked back at his son. Fast asleep. He looked out beyond him. The lure of the woods was like a drug to Ethan. He felt the sway and pull of the forest as if it touched him, tugged on his coat sleeve.

He quietly shut the door and headed into the forest. He left the gun in the truck. It was an ancient dual sighted 30-30 Savage he'd bought in Los Angeles at an army surplus store years before and restored and maintained. He knew there were better guns out there. But over the years, Ethan had grown used to the old Savage. He knew its rhythms and feel. It was a gun that rarely failed him.

The buck had gone upwind, into a narrow crag. Ethan walked a few feet and then stopped to look back at the truck. He could still see it, still see the outline of the car seat and Nate, his head forward in sleep. He told himself he'd go a little further and only for another minute. He wasn't a gambling man, especially when it came to Nate. But those buck were beauties. Mature trophy buck. They were food for the rest of the winter and an enviable rack for the garage wall.

He walked a ways longer and then, pausing, stopping, gambling, he followed the deer trail into a steep ravine where the vanished glaciers had left behind silver white rock surfaces, so polished and smooth that one day last spring, Ethan had watched as Nate licked the side of one. He remembered he hadn't stopped his son, only wished that he had thought to do it himself.

The deer themselves were out of sight but Ethan, who had trained himself to spot such things, knew that they would keep traveling in the same direction, into the wind. They would not venture into the open ground. They would stay under the cover of trees and close to canyon walls, hidden among the kalmia and cassiope.

Once more Ethan looked back. The truck was no longer visible but he knew it was not far. He told himself that just this once, he'd keep walking. Luck was with him. Hadn't he just won custody, full custody of his son? Hadn't most things gone his way in life? He figured that just this once, he could let his guard down. He'd walk just a few more feet along this old, now abandoned trailhead, savor the solitude, forget just for a brief moment all of his responsibility and pretend. I am free. Then he'd get back to the truck--Nate would probably still be asleep--and head into town to open the hardware store. Maybe on the way home, Nate would wake up and Ethan would tell him how beautiful the woods were, how fine and strong the deer. He would promise to take him out again later, because Ethan knew Nate would be disappointed to miss this morning sojourn.

The air felt tense. It would probably snow within the hour....

„Über diesen Titel“ kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Verlag
Doubleday
Erscheinungsdatum
2004
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
038551185X
ISBN 13 
9780385511858
Einband
Gebundene Ausgabe
Anzahl der Seiten
303
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
Nicht verfügbar