The Good Echo - Paperback

by Shena McAuliffe (Author)

Winner of the The Big Moose Prize and the Balcones Fiction Prize. Set in the 1930s, and spanning the globe, THE GOOD ECHO is the story of a marriage between controversial nutritionist and dentist Clifford Bell, and his quietly courageous wife Frances. After their young son dies from surgery Clifford performs, the two seek to escape their grief through unconventional means, traveling from Ohio to Sudan, to substantiate a theory of which Clifford's colleagues are skeptical. Narrated in turn by Frances and Clifford, and by the ghost of their son Benjamin, THE GOOD ECHO is composed of postcards and bedtime stories, folktales and family legends, travel and research notes. THE GOOD ECHO celebrates the healing that can arise through sustained curiosity, and how our deepest sadness sometimes initiates the boldest adventures of our lives.

Author Biography

Shena McAuliffe was born in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, and grew up outside of Denver, Colorado. She holds an M.F.A. in from Washington University in St. Louis, and a Ph.D. from the University of Utah. She was the R.P. Dana Emerging Writer at Cornell College, and taught at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana before moving to Schenectady, New York, where she is an Assistant Professor of English. She is the author of We Are a Teeming Wilderness: Stories (2022), Glass, Light, Electricity: Essays (2020) and The Good Echo: A Novel (2018), winner of the Big Moose Prize.