What is Cynthia Swanson reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Cynthia Swanson, author of The Glass Forest.

The entry begins:

As an author, I’ve been the fortunate recipient of many advance reader copies of soon-to-be-released books. Two that came into my hands recently are The Philosopher’s Flight by Tom Miller and Not That I Could Tell by Jessica Strawser.

Miller’s debut novel, The Philosopher’s Flight opens just after the US enters World War I. Eighteen-year-old Robert Weekes is an empirical philosopher – a branch of science mixed with a bit of magic that allows its practitioners to take (wingless) flight, “carve” smoke, and communicate with each other via small wooden boards strapped to their wrists, upon which they scribble in shorthand wittily similar to modern-day texts.

The vast majority of empirical philosophers are women; most men lack the aptitude to be successful practitioners. This creates an alternate history in which major events such as the Civil War were resolved by the proficiency of women rather than the firepower of men.

Though less skilled than most female philosophers, Robert sidesteps becoming a WWI doughboy by...[read on]

About The Glass Forest, from the publisher:

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Bookseller comes a gripping literary suspense novel set in the 1960s about a deeply troubled family and three women who will reveal its dark truths.

In the autumn of 1960, Angie Glass is living an idyllic life in her Wisconsin hometown. At twenty-one, she’s married to charming, handsome Paul, and has just given birth to a baby boy. But one phone call changes her life forever.

When Paul’s niece, Ruby, reports that her father, Henry, has committed suicide, and that her mother, Silja, is missing, Angie and Paul drop everything and fly to the small upstate town of Stonekill, New York to be by Ruby’s side.

Angie thinks they’re coming to the rescue of Paul’s grief-stricken young niece, but Ruby is a composed and enigmatic seventeen-year-old who resists Angie’s attempts to nurture her. As Angie learns more about the complicated Glass family, staying in Henry and Silja’s eerie and ultra-modern house on the edge of the woods, she begins to question the very fabric of her own marriage.

Through Silja’s flashbacks, Angie’s discovery of astonishing truths, and Ruby’s strategic dissection of her parents’ state of affairs, a story of love, secrets, and ultimate betrayal is revealed.

Visit Cynthia Swanson's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Bookseller.

The Page 69 Test: The Glass Forest.

Writers Read: Cynthia Swanson.

--Marshal Zeringue