Ann Packer

Twenty-three-year-old Carrie Bell feels suffocated and wants to leave her life in Wisconsin, but when her fiancé is paralyzed in a diving accident, she must ask, how much do we owe the people we love? How much do we owe the people we love? Is it a sign of strength or weakness to walk away from someone in need? These questions lie at the heart of Ann Packer's intimate and emotionally thrilling new novel, which has won its author comparisons with Jane Hamilton and Sue Miller. At the age of twenty-three Carrie Bell has spent her entire life in Wisconsin, with the same best friend and the same dependable, easygoing, high school sweetheart. Now to her dismay she has begun to find this life suffocating and is considering leaving it-and Mike-behind. But when Mike is paralyzed in a diving accident, leaving seems unforgivable and yet more necessary than ever. The Dive from Clausen's Pier animates this dilemma-and Carrie's startling response to it-with the narrative assurance, exacting realism, and moral complexity we expect from the very best fiction.

The dive from Clausen's pier

When their troubled youngest sibling returns, the three oldest Blair children, adults now and still living near the family home, find their lives disrupted in ways they could have never imagined as they each tell their story that is interwoven with portraits of their family at crucial points in their history.

A Novel

The Children's Crusade

Songs without words

Mendocino and Other Stories

Chronicles the long-time friendship between Liz and Sarabeth, a relationship that is forged in childhood and sustained through the decades that follow, until both women are forced to reexamine their lives in the wake of a devastating crisis.

Songs Without Words

From Ann Packer, author of the New York Times best-selling novels The Dive from Clausen’s Pier and Songs Without Words, a collection of burnished, emotionally searing stories, framed by two unforgettable linked narratives that express the transformation of a single family over the course of a lifetime. A wife struggles to make sense of her husband’s sudden disappearance. A mother mourns her teenage son through the music collection he left behind. A woman shepherds her estranged parents through her brother’s wedding and reflects on the year her family collapsed. A young man comes to grips with the joy—and vulnerability—of fatherhood. And, in the masterly opening novella, two teenagers from very different families forge a sustaining friendship, only to discover the disruptive and unsettling power of sex. Ann Packer is one of our most talented archivists of family life, with its hidden crevasses and unforeseeable perils, and in these stories she explores the moral predicaments that define our social and emotional lives, the frailty of ordinary grace, and the ways in which we are shattered and remade by loss. With Swim Back to Me, she delivers shimmering psychological precision, unfailing intelligence, and page-turning drama: her most enticing work yet.

Swim Back to Me

How much do we owe the people we love? Is it a sign of strength or weakness to walk away from someone in need? These questions lie at the heart of Ann Packer’s intimate and emotionally thrilling new novel, which has won its author comparisons with Jane Hamilton and Sue Miller. At the age of twenty-three Carrie Bell has spent her entire life in Wisconsin, with the same best friend and the same dependable, easygoing, high school sweetheart. Now to her dismay she has begun to find this life suffocating and is considering leaving it–and Mike–behind. But when Mike is paralyzed in a diving accident, leaving seems unforgivable and yet more necessary than ever. The Dive from Clausen’s Pier animates this dilemma–and Carrie’s startling response to it–with the narrative assurance, exacting realism, and moral complexity we expect from the very best fiction.

The Dive From Clausen's Pier

Carrie Bell was born and raised in Wisconsin. She's had the same best friend, the same good relationship with her mother, the same boyfriend for as long as anyone can remember. She is already quietly bored with Mike when he is horrifically injured in a diving accident at Clausen's Reservoir. Now the future that Carrie was only beginning to rebel against looks set in stone. Everyone thinks they know what Carrie will - and ought to - do. But Carrie is caught in a maze of moral dilemmas and is forced to question everything she thought she knew about herself. It is a moment of terrifying confusion, but also of mesmerising possibility.

The Dive from Clausen's Pier

AN OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB PICK “Profound and moving and real.”—Andrew Sean Greer “Some Bright Nowhere is a novel that draws you in deeply and holds you there. Wonderful.”—Meg Wolitzer The bestselling, beloved author returns with her first novel in over a decade, an intimate and profoundly moving look at a long marriage and the ways in which a startling request can change a couple’s understanding of who they are, together and apart. Eliot and his wife Claire have been happily married for nearly four decades. They’ve raised two children in their sleepy Connecticut town and have weathered the inevitable ups and downs of a long life spent together. But eight years after Claire was diagnosed with cancer, the end is near, and it's time to gather loved ones and prepare for the inevitable. Over the years of Claire’s illness, Eliot has willingly—lovingly—shifted into the role of caregiver, appreciating the intimacy and tenderness that comes with a role even more layered and complex than the one he performed as a devoted husband. But as he focuses on settling into what will be their last days and weeks together, Claire makes an unexpected request that leaves him reeling. In a moment, his carefully constructed world is shattered. What if your partner’s dying wish broke your heart? How well do we know the deepest desires of those we love dearly? As Eliot is confronted with this profound turning point in his marriage and his life, he grapples with the man and husband he’s been, and with the great unknowns of Claire’s last days. Ann Packer makes a triumphant return with this powerful novel that is tender and raw, visceral and unexpected. Emotionally vibrant and complex, Some Bright Nowhere explores the profound gifts and unexpected costs of truly loving someone, and the fears and desires we experience as the end of life draws near.

Some Bright Nowhere

A novel for secondary school English classes with great writing and important themes.

In 1954 Bill Blair and Penny Greenway marry and have four children. Thirty years later, the three oldest Blair children, adults now and still living near the family home, are disrupted by the return of the youngest, whose sudden presence and all-too-familiar troubles force a reckoning with who they are, separately and together, and set off a struggle over the family's future.

Brilliant guide to the many places in New Zealand where you can buy everything you need to make your own textile-based crafts. Aimed at those who get warm fuzzies just walking into a wool shop, simply have to stroke the fabric at the quilt store, and long to touch the textiles at museums, this roundup of New Zealand's craftiest places will go down a treat. The book lists treasure troves for fabric lovers, embroiderers, patchworkers, knitters, spinners and other crafty types to find not only materials but inspiration on the road. And because they need frequent cups of coffee to fuel their journey and somewhere to lay their head, the book includes some favourite places along the way. There are also excellent lists of great crafty blogs and events.

Ann Packer

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