Carry the One - A Novel

A moving and “beautifully observed” (The New York Times) story about how the events of a single night ripple through the lives they touch, revealing how deeply interconnected we are, and how those who flourish and those who unravel may be far closer than they seem.

Late one night in 1983, after Carmen’s wedding reception at an artists’ co-op in rural Wisconsin, a carload of drunk and tired wedding guests begin a drive back to Chicago when tragedy strikes on a dark country road.

Over the next twenty-five years, the events from that night continue to haunt those involved in the accident as they connect and disconnect, never completely free of each other or the accident that binds them together. It echoes through each of their struggles with love, relationships, marriage, parenthood, careers, political activism, and addiction.

Carry the One powerfully explores how one life affects another, and how those who thrive and those who self-destruct are closer to each other than we’d expect. Whether they take refuge in art, drugs, social justice, or love, Carol Anshaw’s characters are sympathetic, funny, and uncannily familiar as they reflect back to us our deepest pain and longings, our joys, and our transcendent moments of understanding.