Pushcart Prize nominee Dave King delivers a moving novel that explores the nature of family. Wounded in Vietnam, Howard Kapostash is unable to speak, read or write, although his intelligence is normal. Now middle-aged, he lives a lonely existence. But then his former high school sweetheart entrusts her nine-year-old son to Howard when she enters drug rehab. Suddenly a father figure, Howard begins to open up, and the emotional wounds of his past start to heal. “. lovingly rendered in careful, steady prose . explores familial bonds arising between people with no blood ties . with poise and heart.”-Publishers Weekly

Howard Kapostash has not spoken in thirty years. The small repertory of gestures and simple sounds that he uses to communicate lead most people to assume he is disturbed. No one understands that Howard is still the same man he was before his tragic injury. But when he agrees to help an old girlfriend by opening his home to her nine-year-old son, the presence of this nervous, resourceful boy in his life transforms Howard utterly. He is afforded a rare glimpse of life outside his shell? With all its exuberant joys and crushing sorrows.