"Blue Hour is an elusive book, because it is ever in pursuit of what the German poet Novalis called 'the [lost] presence beyond appearance.' The longest poem, 'On Earth,' is a transcription of mind passing from life into death, in the form of an abecedary, modeled on ancient gnostic hymns. Other poems in the book, especially 'Nocturne' and 'Blue Hour,' are lyric recoveries of the act of remembering, though the objects of memory seem to us vivid and...

What is motherhood in the midst of uncertainty, buried trauma, and an unraveling America? What it's always been-a love song. Our narrator is a gifted photographer, an uncertain wife, an infertile mother, a biracial woman in an unraveling America. As she grapples with a lifetime of ambivalence about motherhood, yet another act of police brutality makes headlines, and this time the victim is Noah, a boy in her photography class. Unmoored by the grief...

"The tight-knit residents of Blue Moon Mountain, nestled high in the Colorado Mountains, form an interconnected community of those living off the land, stunned by the beauty and isolation all around them. So when, at the onset of winter, the town veterinarian commits a violent act, the repercussions of that tragedy will be felt all across the mountainside, upending their lives and causing their paths to twist and collide in unexpected ways. The housecleaner...

John Rechy's first novel, City of Night, an international bestseller, is considered a modern classic. Subsequent work asserts his place among America's most important writers. The author's most daring work, After the Blue Hour is narrated by a twenty-four-year-old writer named John Rechy. Fleeing a turbulent life in Los Angeles, John accepts an invitation to a private island from an admirer of his work. There, he joins Paul, his imposing host in...