Night Navigation: A Novel

ISBN: 0547335970

Author: Howard, Ginnah

Condition: New

Night Navigation opens on a freezing-rain night in upstate New York: the kindling gone, the fire in the woodstove out. Dels thirty-seven-year-old manic-depressive son needs a ride, but shes afraid to make the long drive north to the only detox that has a bed.Through the four seasons, Night Navigation takes us into the deranged, darkly humorous world of the addict-from break-your-arm dealers, to boot-camp rehabs, to Rumi-quoting NA sponsors. Al-Anon tells Del to let go; NAMI tells her to hang on. Mark cannot find a way to live in this world. Del cannot stop trying to rescue him. And yet, during this long years night, through relapse and despair, they see flare-ups of hope as Mark and Del fitfully, painfully try to steer toward the light.Told in the alternating voices of an addict and his mother, this riveting novel adds new depths to our understanding and our literature of parents and their troubled children.