If I Knew You Were Going to Be This Beautiful, I Never Would Have Let You Go

“Brings to mind the books of Richard Price and the films of Martin Scorsese... I did not want this book to end.” —Julie Klam, New York Times –bestselling author of Friendkeeping It is the summer of 1972, and Katie has just turned eighteen. Katie and her town, Elephant Beach, are both on the verge: Katie of adulthood, and Elephant Beach of gentrification. But not yet: Elephant Beach is still gritty, working-class, close-knit. And Katie spends her time smoking and drinking with her friends, dreaming about a boy just back from Vietnam who’s still fighting a battle Katie can’t understand. In this poignant, evocative debut collection, Judy Chicurel creates a haunting, vivid world, where conflicts between mothers and daughters, men and women, soldiers and civilians and haves and have-nots reverberate to our own time. She captures not only a time and place, but the universal experience of being poised between the past and the future. At once heartbreaking, mesmerizing, and nostalgic, Chicurel shows us that no matter how beautiful some dreams are, there comes a time when we must let them go. No matter how beautiful some dreams are, there comes a time when we must let them go. It is the summer of 1972, and Katie has just turned eighteen. Katie and her town, Elephant Beach, are both on the verge: Katie of adulthood, and Elephant Beach of gentrification. But not yet: Elephant Beach is still gritty, working-class, close-knit. And Katie spends her time smoking and drinking with her friends, dreaming about a boy just back from Vietnam who's still fighting a battle Katie can't understand. In this poignant, evocative debut collection, Judy Chicurel creates a haunting, vivid world, where conflicts between mothers and daughters, men and women, soldiers and civilians and haves and have-nots reverberate to our own time. She captures not only a time and place, but the universal experience of being poised between the past and the future. For fans of Pam Houston's Cowboys Are My Weakness'a novel in stories about a young woman and her town in the early 1970s. It is the summer of 1972, and Katie has just turned eighteen. Katie and her town, Elephant Beach, are both on the verge: Katie of adulthood, and Elephant Beach of gentrification. But not yet: Elephant Beach is still gritty, working-class, close-knit. And Katie spends her time smoking and drinking with her friends, dreaming about a boy just back from Vietnam who's still fighting a battle Katie can't understand. Impeccably crafted and hugely affectionate, this novel in stories is a vivid portrait of a place whose conflicts'between mothers and daughters, men and women, haves and have-nots' reverberate to our own time A novel in stories about a young woman's coming of age during the summer of 1972 in a gritty, working-class community on the brink of gentrification traces her hedonist associations with friends and her struggles to understand her Vietnam-haunted crush