Bart Yates Books

Noah York is a closeted gay teenager with a foul mouth, a critical disposition, and plenty of material for his tirades. After his father dies, Noah's mother, a temperamental poet, takes a teaching job in a small New Hampshire town, far from Chicago and the only world Noah has known. While Noah gets along reasonably with his mother, the crumbling house they try to renovate quickly reveals dark secrets, via dusty Mason jars they discover interred between walls. The jars contain scraps of letters, poems, and journal entries, and eventually reconstructs a history of pain and violence that drives a sudden wedge between Noah and his mother. Fortunately, Noah finds an unexpected ally in J.D., a teenager down the street who has family troubles of his own.

Readers of Mad Honey will appreciate this touching and buoyant novel from an award-winning author. When his difficult mother is diagnosed with ALS, a sharp-witted yet sensitive artist returns to his New Hampshire hometown, confronting the ghosts he left behind. For Noah York, home is Oakland, New Hampshire, where his mother, Virginia, had a psychotic breakdown and where he faced painful memories from his teenage years. Now thirty-seven and struggling as an artist in Providence, Rhode Island, Noah grapples with his past and the label of “The Lost Soul,” given to him by Virginia, who has become a successful poet. He also contends with J.D., the one who got away, now happily married to someone else. Reluctant to heed his mother’s call, Noah learns she has shattering news and a request he cannot refuse. He embarks on a journey to find the sister and extended family he never knew, navigate family dynamics, and confront his past, including his feelings for J.D. Amidst the chaos, he must also deal with his unpredictable mother. Bittersweet, hilarious, and deeply moving, this story explores themes of growing older, getting lost, and ultimately finding one’s way back to what truly matters.

At the age of ninety-six, Isaac Dahl sits down to write his memoir. For Isaac, an accomplished journalist and historian, finding the right words is never a problem. But this book will be different from anything he has written before. Focusing on twelve different days, each encapsulated in a chapter, Isaac hopes to distill the very essence of his life.There are days that begin like any other, only to morph through twists of fate. An avalanche strikes Bingham, Utah, and 8-year-old Isaac and his twin sister, Agnes, survive when they are trapped in an upside-down bathtub. Other days stand apart—including a day in 1942, when Isaac, stationed on the USS Houston in the Java Sea as a rookie correspondent, confronts the full horror of war. And there are days spent simply, with his lifelong friend, Bo, or with Danny, the younger man whose love transforms Isaac’s later years—precious days with significance that grows clear only in hindsight.From the Oklahoma Dust Bowl to a Mississippi school at the apex of the civil rights movement, Isaac tells his story with insight, wisdom, and an emotional depth that reminds us there is no such thing as an ordinary life—and the greatest accomplishment of all is to live and love fully.