The Last Tale of Norah Bow
“Given White’s obvious knowledge of—and affection for—the water, his squall does not disappoint.”
— Sarah Steers, BOOKLIST
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What People Are Saying
“His lyrical way with words in this story is thrilling”
— Mary Ann Grossman, St. Paul Pioneer Press
“It has all the essentials of a good story”
— Bill Trembley
“Like Homer’s Odyssey,
Norah Bow is a voyage—ultimately, a voyage home.”
— Lon Otto
“White’s writing is lyrical and creates a haunting atmosphere that lingers long after the last page.”
— Julie Small
Sarah Steers, BOOKLIST
“White (Every Boat Turns South, 2009) packs his latest novel with every Prohibition stereotype imaginable: sexy flappers, rapacious gangsters, degenerate rumrunners, and fast-talking, precocious teens. But to White’s credit, he places the characters in a series of atypical settings. The titular Norah Bow is introduced at her home in Rye Beach, Ohio; her beloved father is soon kidnapped from the dinner table by masked bootleggers. When the local police decline to investigate, Norah sets out in her sailboat to find him. Miles offshore on Lake Erie, Norah stumbles upon a waterlogged showstopper named Ruby Francoeur, who begrudgingly agrees to help Norah with her quest. Theirs proves to be a complicated friendship, comprising equal parts affection, tenderness, resentment, and frustration. As Norah and Ruby island-hop across Lake Erie, finally disembarking in Detroit, each is forced to confront her own role in acts of unspeakable violence and human depravity. A novel this emotional (and lakefront oriented) deserves a final, explosive storm scene. Given White’s obvious knowledge of—and affection for—the water, his squall does not disappoint.”
Mary Ann Grossman, ST.PAUL PIONEER PRESS
“From the first pages of J.P. White’s second novel (after “Every Boat Turns South”), we cheer for plain-spoken, almost fearless Norah Bow, a 14-year-old who sets out, somewhat foolishly, to find her dad. It’s 1926, Prohibition is making a lot of people rich, and Norah finds herself in the middle of rumrunners, shady men, assorted odd characters and, most of all, on Lake Erie in the sailboat she and her dad made from the finest wood they could afford. White, who has published six poetry collections, shows his lyrical way with words in this story that is also thrilling when Norah fights a storm that almost swamps her boat. His account is drawn from his experiences growing up in a sailing family on the lake. ” My poetry and fiction nearly always circle back to elemental forces I was first exposed to as a child,” he writes on his website.”
Lon Otto, author of A Man in Trouble
“Like Homer’s Odyssey, Norah Bow is a voyage—ultimately, a voyage home. Through storms and calm, night sailing a great lake in a small boat, Norah is on a quest for answers to dangerous questions. There’s a wonderfully vivid sense of place in this book: Lake Erie, its islands and inlets and its treacherous weather, the seedy dockyards of Prohibition-era Detroit, its whiskey river roaring with deadly opportunity. Norah Bow is unfailingly eventful (buildings are destroyed, weapons wound and kill, death by drowning threatens more than once), but the story’s real drama lies in Norah’s heart, torn with suspicion, driven by love.”
Captain Ben Batsch
“Well, I finished wonderful tale of Norah Bow and loved it. She is really my favorite kind of heroine- young, highly intelligent, smart-mouthed, precocious, impetuous, wise beyond her years, but still dealing with those issues that most girls her age have. She’s skilled with her hands and isn’t afraid of a little dirt. I like that she’s very confident except when she isn’t.”
“The Last Tale of Norah Bow, by J. P. White, is a sea-yarn set not in the Aegean but Lake Erie whose vast shipping lanes have conducted the commerce of America ever since there was an America. It has all the essentials of a good story—a strong teen-aged girl with a compelling reason that drives her actions. Her father’s been kidnapped by Prohibition era gangsters and she’s determined to find him and bring him back into the bosom of his family or die trying, if need be. So Norah becomes a tomboy version of Telemachus (as in Homer’s The Odyssey) and as is the way with episodic narratives she meets up with a cast of characters vaguely like Polyphemus, Charon, and especially Circe in the person of one Ruby Francoeur, a bewitching enchantress who uses her beauty and her wits to navigate the dangerous shoals of the illicit whiskey trade.”
Julie Small
“I was drawn to Norah and her journey. The story is a moving exploration of what it means for a young girl to come to terms with adult world and her father’s shortcomings. White’s writing is lyrical and creates a haunting atmosphere that lingers long after the last page.”
About J.P. White
J.P. White has published essays, articles, fiction, reviews, interviews, and poetry in over a hundred publications. A highly acclaimed, award-winning writer, White pushes beyond the boundaries of the lyric/narrative tradition to let more of the flux and wonder of the human condition rush in.