Peace Like a River

Summary: "[A]s clichd as [Enger's] basic enterprise is, he manages to infuse sections of this novel with some surprisingly lively writing and deftly turned sentences. But ultimately the book suffers from a surplus of pretension...and a dearth of surprises. Enger's world, full of simple pleasures and populated by deep-thinking nafs, seems unlikely to have ever existed, in this century or any other."