The Daughters of Simon Lamoreaux

by David Long

On a hazy Friday in May 1973, Carolyn Lamoreaux vanishes during a high school choir practice in Hartford, Connecticut. Her boyfriend, Miles Fanning, waits disconsolately at the secret place where... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0684854147
• ISBN13: 9780684854144
• Release Date: May 2000
• Publisher: Scribner Book Company
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.7" x 8.7"

Customer Reviews

Gets your attention fast and keeps it

The Daughters of Simon Lamoreaux opens with a stunning prologue. A high school couple in New England has planned a secret rendezvous during a choir rehearsal -- but the young girl never appears at their designated meeting spot. The first chapter flash forwards to about 20 years later, when the man, Miles Fanning, is married and running a record label in Seattle. He is married, but on a four-month, mutually agreed upon separation from his wife. Out of the blue, he receives a call from the sister, Julia, of the girl who had disappeared. They meet briefly, then trade a series of late-night calls and e-mails, in which Julia informs Miles about the impact that her sister's disappearance had on her family, and in particular, her deeply religious father who is confused about God's silence on the matter of his absent daughter. The writing here is beautiful, and the characters are perfectly drawn. Julia is entirely caught up in yesterday. She remembers every last detail of the turmoil she went through and the scars are physically and emotionally visible. She's a razor-thin bulimic with a caustic wit. She goes through some kind of catharsis spilling everything out to Miles. Miles is just the opposite. If Julia seems pained because she feels too much, Miles seems deadened because he didn't allow himself to feel enough. He had completely forgotten all but the vaguest details of the incident with Julia's sister, Carly. But his marriage suffered because he was so closed off from his wife. Julia wakes something up in him. Like others here, I couldn't put this book down. This isn't by any way a mystery, in the genre sense of the word. The main mystery here comes from the gradual unfolding of what makes these two characters tick and what forces can propel them to change. I'm eagerly going to read Long's other work now because I was so impressed by this novel.

Pages Full of Beauty

This is a beautifully written book with a story that is both gentle and compelling. I hesitated reading it because I am a fan of the true crime genre and was afraid I would find "The Daughters..." just too tame. I was right in a way. It is a tame book; but it's brave, too and a delight from start to finish. I read it in a day and a half and hated the moments I didn't have it in front of me. I read and re-read some of Mr. Long's passages as I moved along, looking forward to the end of the tale, but hating to reach the end of the book. I can't wait until enough time has passed so that I can read it again.

Couldn't put it down...

I started reading "The Daughters of Simon Lamoreaux" and couldn't put it down. I finished the book in one sitting--well I did get up to stretch once in a while and eat, but that was it. If you like beautifully written stories with fine characterization, a great plot, and a strong sense of place, you will enjoy this book.Miles Fanning and Julia Lamoreaux are the only survivors of a tragedy that occurred 24 years earlier when they were teenagers. Both of them suffered psychological damage following the mysterious disappearance of Julia's sister Carolyn (Carly) who was Miles 17 year-old girl friend. Carly was supposed to get together with Miles during a lunch break the day she disappeared, but she never arrived at the meeting place. Was she a runaway, was she abducted? The mystery remains unsolved and Carly's disappearance profoundly affects the lives of those who love her--her parents, her sister, and Miles. After Carly's disappearance, Miles appears to go on with his life. He graduates from high school, attends the University of Michigan where he majors in journalism, and ends up directing a Windom House type music recording business in Seattle. He marries the beautiful Kyra who bears a physical resemblance to Carly. But Miles is an insomniac workaholic who has never addressed the terrible emotional consequences of Carly's disappearanceCarly's younger sister Julia suffers a similar fate. 24 years later these two damaged souls connect and begin the difficult process of unraveling the past, facing old ghosts, and experiencing the healing of old wounds. Davin Long's story is an extremely well written psychological tale with a Hitchcock twist, fantastic dialogue, and beautiful imagery that provides a lyrical beat. I will read other works by this author.

masterful and moving

THE DAUGHTERS OF SIMON LAMOREAUX confirms David Long as America's greatest underappreciated fiction writer. The novel is propelled by a mystery - what happened to Carly Lamoreaux? - and is in its way a page-turner, but eschews the cardboard conventions of the mystery genre. Here, it's not the cause but the effects that are riveting; the fact of what happened to Carly is less important than what her disappearance does to those around her. Likewise, Long's writing is as much concerned with the silences around words as the words themselves. His prose is at once pared down and profligate. Read it aloud! Like the best novels, this one makes you want to read it again, and to read others as well; rather than providing any pat answers (to its own plot, or to human psychology), it opens into wider and wider questions. David Long has given us a subtle, haunting, funny, sexy, and utterly unforgettable story.

Another Amazing Effort by Long

I've long been a fan of David Long's short fiction, and I was pleasantly surprised a couple of years ago to find that The Falling Boy was just as compelling and gorgeously written. Now this new novel convinces me that Long is a very underrated writer. This story is suspenseful, intriguing, and, again, masterfully written with phrases that simply stun me. Though I was disappointed that the book wasn't set in Montana like much of Long's work, I continue to be a big fan with The Daughters of Simon Lamoreaux. This was luxurious to read.