NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • OPRAH'S BOOK CLUB PICK
‘The story of relationships built and broken, mistakes inherited and repeated, and the beauty of trying again….already one of the year’s best.’ –People
Cece is in love. She has arrived early at her future in-laws’ lake house in Salish, Montana, to finish planning her wedding to Charlie, a young doctor with a brilliant life ahead of him. Charlie has asked Garrett, his best friend from college, to officiate the ceremony, though Cece can’t imagine anyone more ill-suited for the task—an airport baggage handler haunted by a tragedy from his and Charlie’s shared past. But as Cece spends time with Garrett, his gruff mask slips, and she grows increasingly uncertain about her future. And why does Garrett, after meeting Cece, begin to feel, well, human again? As a contagious stomach flu threatens to scuttle the wedding, and Charlie and Garrett’s friendship is put to the ultimate test, Cece must decide between the life she’s dreamed of and a life she’s never imagined.
The events of that summer have long-lasting repercussions, not only on the three friends caught in its shadow but also on their children, who struggle to escape their parents’ story. Spanning fifty years and set against the backdrop of a rapidly warming Montana, Dream State explores what it means to live with the mistakes of the past—both our own and the ones we’ve inherited.
Written with humor, precision, and enormous heart, both a love letter and an elegy to the American West, Dream State is a thrillingly ambitious ode to the power of friendship, the weird weather of marriage, and the beauty of impermanence.
Genre: Literary Fiction
‘The story of relationships built and broken, mistakes inherited and repeated, and the beauty of trying again….already one of the year’s best.’ –People
Cece is in love. She has arrived early at her future in-laws’ lake house in Salish, Montana, to finish planning her wedding to Charlie, a young doctor with a brilliant life ahead of him. Charlie has asked Garrett, his best friend from college, to officiate the ceremony, though Cece can’t imagine anyone more ill-suited for the task—an airport baggage handler haunted by a tragedy from his and Charlie’s shared past. But as Cece spends time with Garrett, his gruff mask slips, and she grows increasingly uncertain about her future. And why does Garrett, after meeting Cece, begin to feel, well, human again? As a contagious stomach flu threatens to scuttle the wedding, and Charlie and Garrett’s friendship is put to the ultimate test, Cece must decide between the life she’s dreamed of and a life she’s never imagined.
The events of that summer have long-lasting repercussions, not only on the three friends caught in its shadow but also on their children, who struggle to escape their parents’ story. Spanning fifty years and set against the backdrop of a rapidly warming Montana, Dream State explores what it means to live with the mistakes of the past—both our own and the ones we’ve inherited.
Written with humor, precision, and enormous heart, both a love letter and an elegy to the American West, Dream State is a thrillingly ambitious ode to the power of friendship, the weird weather of marriage, and the beauty of impermanence.
Genre: Literary Fiction
Praise for this book
"Dream State is a gorgeous exploration of time, grief, love, and the way that the commitments we make turn us into the people we become...brilliant." - Danielle Evans
"Eric Puchner's Dream State delivers everything I want in a novel: a love triangle, a moving friendship story, a delicious setting (including some of the best skiing scenes I've ever read in my life) and rumination about how we search for meaning in our lives...an absolute masterpiece." - Elin Hilderbrand
"A masterpiece. Dream State is a glittering, evocative achievement." - Adam Johnson
"Funny and wild; some of the most beautiful writing that I have ever read." - Matthew Klam
"Dream State is a delight...An exquisitely rendered novel about the vagaries of fate, and friendship, and love." - Alice McDermott
"Dream State explores several monumental themes - love, family, identity, human transience, climate change - but always with a scrupulous attention to the fate of individuals, and always with a powerful sense of intimate connection. . .a remarkable achievement." - Andrew Motion
"Eric Puchner has populated his engrossing and deeply affecting novel with characters so complicated and sympathetic that we want--we need--to know how their lives will turn out, and what will happen to the glorious and fragile landscape they inhabit." - Francine Prose
"Filled to the brim with life, Dream State is a wonder of character and craft." - Andrew Sean Greer
"Lush, immersive, devastating, and stunningly alive, Dream State did the thing the very best novels do: pulled me relentlessly into its characters, its setting, concerns, losses, and triumphs, only to let me loose again with a sharper, clearer vision of the world outside." - Lynn Steger Strong
"Eric Puchner's Dream State delivers everything I want in a novel: a love triangle, a moving friendship story, a delicious setting (including some of the best skiing scenes I've ever read in my life) and rumination about how we search for meaning in our lives...an absolute masterpiece." - Elin Hilderbrand
"A masterpiece. Dream State is a glittering, evocative achievement." - Adam Johnson
"Funny and wild; some of the most beautiful writing that I have ever read." - Matthew Klam
"Dream State is a delight...An exquisitely rendered novel about the vagaries of fate, and friendship, and love." - Alice McDermott
"Dream State explores several monumental themes - love, family, identity, human transience, climate change - but always with a scrupulous attention to the fate of individuals, and always with a powerful sense of intimate connection. . .a remarkable achievement." - Andrew Motion
"Eric Puchner has populated his engrossing and deeply affecting novel with characters so complicated and sympathetic that we want--we need--to know how their lives will turn out, and what will happen to the glorious and fragile landscape they inhabit." - Francine Prose
"Filled to the brim with life, Dream State is a wonder of character and craft." - Andrew Sean Greer
"Lush, immersive, devastating, and stunningly alive, Dream State did the thing the very best novels do: pulled me relentlessly into its characters, its setting, concerns, losses, and triumphs, only to let me loose again with a sharper, clearer vision of the world outside." - Lynn Steger Strong
Visitors also looked at these books
Used availability for Eric Puchner's Dream State
Genre Pages