"Deer can jump fences, but antelope can't . . . it's a failing that almost costs them their lives," Willy Blunt once told Judith Whitman. For Judith, it's little tidbits like this—and other cherished memories from her past—that don't bear their full weight until life comes full circle nearly 30 years after she left her childhood home. What—and who—Judith chose to leave behind in Rufus Sage, Nebraska, leaves her wondering if she's missed her chance at real happiness.

Judith begins withdrawing from her meticulous California life to revisit her past in Rufus Sage. While reinventing parts of her past years, Judith travels back to a period where love and living were simpler. These times were filled discussing literature with her caring father and spending lazy afternoons at the lake with her first love, Willy. The lifelong regret Judith feels from leaving Willy when she went to college inspires her to pack up and re-experience life with him. With one phone call, she abruptly leaves her husband, her teenage daughter and her life on the West Coast to return to Rufus Sage and spend time with Willy. Little does Judith realize that bridging the gap between the past and present is always more complicated than it seems.

To Be Sung Underwater beautifully sings the story of one woman's wrestling with the present realities of a life she created after shedding her hometown skin and abandoning the lover who knew her best. Author Tom McNeal (Goodnight, Nebraska) intricately develops the emotional ties between his characters, capturing the essence of the human heart while rejoicing in the restorative power of reconnection. The novel shows that we may not be able to bring our past with us into the present, but by looking back, we might see just where we are truly meant to be.

McNeal made his name a dozen years ago with Goodnight, Nebraska, and here revisits small-town life by featuring a heroine who wanted to escape it. Judith Whitman believed in passionate love, and she surely loved steady carpenter Willy Blunt. But he was not about to leave Nebraska, and she was. Years later, unsettled in her marriage, she's starting to wonder if she made a mistake—and the chance of finding out looks to be just a phone call away. Sooo romantic, says the publicist, but the taut writing puts it above slush. A literate heartbreaker that reading groups will likely demand.

Judith Whitman is a 44-year-old successful film editor in Los Angeles, with patient husband Malcolm, teenage daughter Camille, and a big secret. Twenty-seven years after she left Rufus Sage, NE, to attend Stanford University, she can't stop thinking about her first love, Willy Blunt. Willy wanted to marry her, but she wanted to go to college first. Then she met Malcolm and just never returned. Judith's life veers off course because of her obsession, and under the assumed name Edie Winks, she hires a private detective to trace her Nebraska friend. She is shocked to find out that Willy ended up marrying her best friend, Deena. Nevertheless, he returns her call and leaves a distressing message that he needs to see her immediately. Covering her trip with lies and a fabricated story about her mother being in a hospital in Mexico, Judith takes off for Nebraska for one last reunion with Willy. Their meeting is very nostalgic but turns bittersweet when she learns the real reason for his desperate plea. VERDICT Award winner McNeal (Goodnight, Nebraska) deftly blends flashbacks of Judith's teen years living with her father in humdrum Rufus Sage with her crisis-filled life in fast-paced L.A. [See Prepub Alert, 12/13/10.]—Donna Bettencourt, Mesa Cty. P.L., Grand Junction, CO

Judith Whitman is 44, questioning her life, and thinking about the hometown boy she jilted almost 30 years before in McNeal's affecting second novel (after Goodnight, Nebraska). At Stanford, Judith had met the "older, urbane" Malcolm and they married, moved to Los Angeles, and built an enviable life. Now she's bored with her suave, unfaithful banker husband, guilty about her lack of maternal feelings for her teenage daughter, and overburdened and distracted at her job editing a "respected television drama." McNeal's agile prose manages to render Judith sympathetic, though she's not an easy character to like. Flashbacks evoke her youth in Vermont, and her decision, when her parents separate and her mother becomes neglectful, to move to Nebraska to live with her father. When Judith, as a high school senior, falls in love with Willy, a local intelligent and sensitive carpenter, she imagines a simple life in the town of Rufus Sage, but after she leaves for college the relationship unravels. Despite a slow start and dialogue heavy on aphorisms, McNeal succeeds with his obvious affection for the daily rhythms of life in Nebraska and his sensitive exploration of marital stresses and psychological accommodations, in addition to a moving surprise denouement. (June)