Finn: A Novel

One hundred and twenty years ago, Mark Twain left Huckleberry Finn's father dead in a room crowded with oddities: a wooden leg, women's underclothing, two black cloth masks, and more. Now, in a resonant and remarkable new novel, Jon Clinch tells the story of how the brutal and explosive Finn met his end in a room jammed with the telltale artifacts of his strange and mysterious life. Along the way, Clinch introduces the reader to a mesmerizing cast of characters: Finn's own fearsome father, known only as the Judge; Finn's brother, the sickly, sycophantic Will; the hermit Bliss, a blind moonshiner; the strong and quick-witted Mary, a former slave who becomes Finn's mistress; and, of course, young Huck himself. Finn is a novel about race, the sin of slavery, and the burdens of paternity. Written in a style both precise and thunderous, understated and violently elemental, it draws from our literary heritage to create something new. Finn is a hypnotic, completely original, distinctive American story.