Three lives, one hundred years, one forgotten town.
In 2024, Nina’s small aircraft crashes into a lake in the Wyoming mountains. Lost, freezing and alone, she stumbles upon Sunrise – an abandoned frontier town that is strangely well-maintained.
In 2003, Sunrise’s golden boy Coll is about to start rehearsals for the town’s annual historical reenactment when he is linked with a scandalous incident at a local bar. When an author comes to him with questions about one of Sunrise’s most beloved figures, Coll is forced to reassess everything he thought he knew about the city – and himself.
In 1902, town founder, gunslinger and adventure-novel hero Anton Vargas returns to Sunrise and helps the search for a missing boy. But who really is Vargas? What does he know about the boy’s disappearance? And why has he returned after so many years away?
These three are strangers, separated by time. But Sunrise has secrets which lie in waiting like gunpowder: quiet, until they encounter a spark.
From the bestselling author of The Tiger’s Wife comes an explosive novel that challenges the myths we think we know: of heroes and villains, of the places we lay claim to, and most of all, of our own lives.
In 2024, Nina’s small aircraft crashes into a lake in the Wyoming mountains. Lost, freezing and alone, she stumbles upon Sunrise – an abandoned frontier town that is strangely well-maintained.
In 2003, Sunrise’s golden boy Coll is about to start rehearsals for the town’s annual historical reenactment when he is linked with a scandalous incident at a local bar. When an author comes to him with questions about one of Sunrise’s most beloved figures, Coll is forced to reassess everything he thought he knew about the city – and himself.
In 1902, town founder, gunslinger and adventure-novel hero Anton Vargas returns to Sunrise and helps the search for a missing boy. But who really is Vargas? What does he know about the boy’s disappearance? And why has he returned after so many years away?
These three are strangers, separated by time. But Sunrise has secrets which lie in waiting like gunpowder: quiet, until they encounter a spark.
From the bestselling author of The Tiger’s Wife comes an explosive novel that challenges the myths we think we know: of heroes and villains, of the places we lay claim to, and most of all, of our own lives.
Reviews
Sunrise is thrilling and ingenious. In her new novel, Obreht explores this country's troubled past, its gaps and silences, and the rich history that only new storytellers can excavate
Twenty-four-year-old Nina survives a plane crash in the Wyoming mountains. While searching for her boyfriend, who was flying the plane, she stumbles into a ghost town in the wilderness. There, she discovers a series of secrets that connect her to a gunslinger from a 1902 pulp novel and a historian trying to preserve the ghost town in 2003, in this triple-timeline story that asks: Who writes history, and what do they have to hide?
Obreht's latest novel is an unputdownable, metafictional, and nimble page-turner . . . The book's structure is part of its pleasure, as is Obreht's uncanny ability to write convincingly, it seems, about everything and everywhere and everyone, her precise, generous prose like being dunked into a new reality; with every section I found myself both anxious to get to the next, to find out what happened, and equally reluctant to leave . . . The result of all this is an adventure novel about what we remember and why, a three-pronged fable about the myths we hold dear, both about ourselves and about men and women we've never met
Sunrise is everything you could wish for from a storyteller of Obreht's caliber: a witty, propulsive tale of survival, a spirited reckoning with the ambivalences of American life, a deep dive into the secret histories of the West. Spellbinding and ingeniously crafted, this novel deepens Obreht's reputation as one of our moment's most original bards and shows the power of story to orient, investigate, and illuminate
I've loved every book Téa Obreht has written but I might love this one the most. It's tense and beautifully constructed, and it features Obreht's signature precision when it comes to both language and emotion. Please put this book into the hands of everyone you know
Téa Obreht never disappoints