Promise

Ann Weisgarber was born and raised in Kettering, Ohio. She has lived in Boston, Massachusetts, and Des Moines, Iowa, but now splits her time between Sugar Land, Texas, and Galveston, Texas. Her first novel The Personal History of Rachel Dupree was longlisted for the Orange Prize and shortlisted for the Orange Prize for New Writers. The Promise was a finalist in the Western Writers of America Best Historical Fiction Awards.

'A gripping, beautiful story of loyalties and hidden loves. Ann Weisgarber's pitch-perfect characters will break your heart and keep you guessing right to the very end' Carol Rifka Brunt, New York Times bestselling author of Tell The Wolves I'm Home 'Set against the worst natural disaster in twentieth century American history, The Promise is a riveting tale, told in lean luminous prose, of the power of love and the frailty of the human condition. Weisgarber knows storms, those that devastate the land and those that rage in the human heart. Her characters will live in your imagination long after you've turned the last deeply moving page' Ellen Feldman, author of Next to Love and Scottsboro In this superb novel, Ann Weisgarber has created voices so convincing it is as if the dead themselves have arisen to tell their story. The Promise is a novel that, once started, few readers will be able to put down. Ron Rash This is a warm and beautiful read, but be warned - you might need to have a box of tissues handy! Essentials magazine In September 1900, a devastating hurricane hit the island city of Galveston in Texas ... Against this dramatic backdrop, acclaimed author Ann Weisgarber has woven a beautiful and breathtaking story of love and loss, new beginnings and old secrets, resentment and reconciliation. The Promise is Weisgarber's first book since The Personal History of Rachel Dupree was nominated for the Orange Prize and it's as haunting as it is exciting. Richly descriptive and exceptionally powerful, the novel is a triumph of intelligent storytelling and understated emotion, and confirms the author as one of the most compelling contemporary literary voices around. At the exquisitely crafted heart of the story is a young woman fleeing social disgrace in sophisticated Dayton, Ohio to marry a man she hasn't seen for 12 years in the vaporising, backwoods heat of Texas ... Weisgarber's masterful evocation of time and place and her portrayal of the simmering tensions created both by the gathering storm and the subtle interplay of the central relationships are the defining elements of this absorbing novel ... The Promise is a challenging, gripping and intensely moving story and highly accessible for a novel of such high literary status. Meticulous research and attention to detail have become the hallmarks of Weisgarber's work. Lancashire Evening Post An emotional and moving story. Galway Now The Promise is beautifully written, and its characters are well-drawn ... a worthy and enjoyable read from an author previously longlisted for the previously-named Orange Prize for Fiction. Historical Novel Society