Knowing that Susan Bernhard has a new book (Westerly) coming out on June 1, 2026, I decided to reread her marvelous debut novel, Winter Loon, before reading the new one.
In Winter Loon, Wes Ballott watches his mother die in a frozen lake in Minnesota. After that horror, he is abandoned by his father and forced to live with his chain-smoking, alcoholic bitter maternal grandparents who kept his mother’s room unchanged for years—hiding truths better left buried—but can’t open their hearts to her son.
Everyone Wes comes into contact is the worst possible role model for a parentless child, yet somehow he finds just the right person to help him heal and move on. Despite the stark emptiness of his life, Wes nearly finds a “real” family when he starts seeing a Native American girl. Eventually he loses even her but has a chance to form another family. Wes’s growth from adolescence to manhood is extraordinary, heart-breaking, yet inspiring.
A brilliantly-written coming-of-age story, Winter Loon has taut yet lyrical prose, words which one doesn’t expect from a debut author, that put me in mind of Louise Erdrich. I particularly enjoyed Bernhard’s recurrent use of the winter loon, weather, nature, and Native American myths to reflect and contrast with her characters.
Winter Loon is not a vapid read, but underlying the central dread and misery, an uplifting redemption filters through like sunshine through leaves, much like that of Demon in Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver. Watching Wes become a better person than anyone in his dysfunctional family is haunting and magical. Several times, though moved to tears, I was forced to continue reading Bernhard’s elegant prose.
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Winter Loon (Little A, December 1, 2018) is available through:
Your local independent bookseller | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
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You can find my review of Demon Copperhead here.
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