December 2008 Featured Book
The Monsters of Templeton
by Lauren Groff '01
- Learn more about the author (view alumni profile)
- Read the Review
- Read an excerpt from The Monsters of Templeton
- Listen to the interview with Professor Paul Rockwell and Lauren Groff '01
- Join the discussion!
- See more books by Lauren Groff '01
One dark summer dawn, at the exact moment that an enormous monster dies in Lake Glimmerglass, twenty-eight-year-old Willie (nee Wilhemina) Upton returns to her hometown of Templeton, NY in disgrace. She expects to be able to hide in the place that has been home to her family for generations, but Willie then learns that the story her mom, Vi, had always told her about her father has all been a lie. He wasn't the one-night stand Vi had led her to imagine, but someone else entirely. Someone from this very town.
As Willie digs for the truth about her lineage, voices from the town's past — both sinister and disturbing — rise up around her to tell their sides of the story. In the end, dark secrets come to light, past and present blur, old mysteries are finally put to rest, and the surprising truth about more than one monster is revealed.