Fri, Jul 07
|Collected Works Bookstore & Coffeehouse
Michael McGarrity, The Long Ago
Michael McGarrity will be in conversation with author Carmella Padilla about his latest novel, a spin-off from his nationally best-selling Kevin Kerney family saga. The Long Ago is a richly crafted and enthralling story of grit, determination, and the enduring, restorative strength of love.
Date, Time & Location
Jul 07, 6:00 PM MDT
Collected Works Bookstore & Coffeehouse, 202 Galisteo St, Santa Fe, NM 87501, USA
About the Event
This will be an in-store presentation and will be live-streamed to Zoom, register here to watch on Zoom.
The Long Ago can be pre-ordered from CW online here or by calling the store. Signed copies will be available after the event.
A soldier returns home from Vietnam in the early 1960s to search for his missing sister in this gripping story of broken lives and a search for happiness.
Growing up in Montana, siblings Raymond and Barbara Lansdale held their chaotic world together through their shared childhood fantasy of The Long Ago: a distant place where happiness and tranquility reigned, far from the dysfunction at home. But imagination only goes so far. To escape his painful past, Ray joins the army and finds a career that gives him a sense of purpose and the promise of adventure.
Recent news of his kid sister’s disappearance brings Ray home on leave before beginning a stateside assignment almost certain to send him back into the jungles of Vietnam. Determined to find Barbara despite a police investigation that has led nowhere, Ray embarks on a relentless search that takes him from the majestic Montana ranchlands and glitter of Hollywood to the mean streets of L.A. and beyond. As time dwindles, he must confront his worst nightmare. What if Barbara’s search for The Long Ago ended in a shallow, unmarked grave, not in the carefree life she’d once so longed for and imagined?
About the Author
Michael McGarrity turned to writing full time with the publication of Tularosa in 1996 after careers as a psychotherapist and deputy sheriff that spanned over twenty-five years.  In 2004 he received the New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts — Literature. He is also the 2015 recipient of the Frank Waters Exemplary Literary Achievement Award and the 2015 Santa Fe Mayor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts – Literature. He has been instrumental in establishing the Hillerman-McGarrity Creative Writing Scholarship at the University of New Mexico, the Richard Bradford Memorial Creative Writing Scholarship at the Santa Fe Community College, and the N. Scott Momaday Creative Writing Scholarship at the Institute of American Indian Arts.
He lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico with his wife Emily Beth (Mimi).