Corey Fischer, a struggling artist, is in big trouble. A lifetime of deference and masking inner-feelings has blinded him to the truth in others, even as those truths emerge onto the canvas of his paintings. The sudden death of his estranged father brings Corey down river, to his hometown of Pepin, Wisconsin, where he confronts past and present torments. The taunting inheritance of a pair of hunting rifles from his dead father, together with a lukewarm reunion with his mother, launches an unraveling of the tenuous ties binding Corey's life together. The inheritance delivers Corey and his husband, Nick, to the Fischer family cabin in northern Wisconsin during hunting season where they head into the woods with loaded guns, and years of simmering resentment. Emotions explode as the couple track a wounded eight-point buck at dusk, and as Nick's betrayals are accidentally revealed. Corey makes a series of panicked, life-defining choices which propel him to flee the trail of destruction his life has wrought, and to seek comfort from those who loved him all along.
Industry Reviews
Elliott Foster has dared to be honest in his newest work Panic River. Set in familiar Upper Mississippi River locales, his novel takes us to the secret interiors of familiar faces and their outdoor lives. His exploration of marriage, family, sexuality and gender identity is courageous, insightful, and compassionate, and his story has cliff-hanger qualities that make it a page turner.
-Emilio Degrazia, Minnesota Book Award winning author of Billy Brazil and Seventeen Grams of Soul
Foster's hero is a man in pain, and the way forward hurts even more. But walls come down, hearts open, and there is such pleasure in sharing the journey.
-Sandra Scofield, National Book Award finalist and American Book Award winning author of Beyond Deserving and Swim: Stories of the Sixties
Panic River is a marvel: equal parts salient, searing portrait of Middle America and taut, orchestrated page-turner full of family secrets that don't stay buried for long. Foster offers up an exquisitely-crafted panoply that grapples with American angst, toxic masculinity, identity, and the expectations we face every day of our lives, all handled with tenderness and deft skill. Yes, this is a luminous novel; I'll happily follow Foster wherever he goes next.
-Robert James Russell, author of Mesilla and Sea of Trees
Elliott Foster became the voice of Minnesota cabin land with Whispering Pines. Now he crosses the river into rural Wisconsin with his darkly droll novel, Panic River. Foster writes characters that are so real and lovably imperfect that you want to shove anyone who bullies them down a staircase. The spark has been dwindling between Corey and his husband Nick, who has not been telling the truth. But in turning the pages I discovered that Corey and his family have more secrets of their own than there are deer in Barron County. And so begins the panic-filled hunt for the real meaning of Corey's inheritance.
-Catherine Dehdashti, author of Roseheart
Novel readers who choose Panic River for its theme of a middle-aged gay man facing his demons and much-changed circumstances will uncover the roots of these connections and will learn how they evolve. They will find Panic River a powerfully evocative, thought-provoking consideration of how life moves on, how freedoms evaporate and re-form, and how one man makes difficult choices that bring him full circle in an unexpected way.
-Midwest Book Review
Review by Kristi Elizabeth, San Francisco Book Review:
Corey Fischer is a struggling artist who once had a dream to become a great artist. After meeting his spouse, Nick, Corey is grateful for meeting someone who treats him so well and who supports his creative endeavors. Nick does not seem to mind supporting both of them. Corey's parents, on the other hand, are not happy that Corey is gay, especially his father. But things aren't all puppies and roses in Corey and Nick's relationship. Nick has cheated on Corey before, and when Nick goes away on a business trip for the bank he works at, Corey is convinced that he is there with a married co-worker named Evan. Corey decides to take his life at that point but is unsuccessful.
I found this book to have an interesting plot that started out well; however, as the story moved on, I started to not like the main character very much. He was just so needy throughout the book that I wanted to roll my eyes and tell him to just "man-up," which is exactly what Corey's father always told him to do because he acted like such a wimp in any circumstance. I could almost feel Corey's anxiety through the pages of the book every time he was thrown into a different situation. He had a hard time adapting to anything and had very low self-esteem on top of that. Throughout the book, it was said several times that Nick was a jerk. And although his cheating was unacceptable and he stepped over the line several times while talking to people, including Corey's mom, I never got the vibe that he was necessarily a jerk. I would say he was j...
