Swallowing Stones

It begins with a free and joyful act--but from then on, Michael finds it impossible even to remember what it felt like to be free and joyful.??When he fires his new rifle into the air on his seventeenth birthday, he never imagines that the bullet will end up killing someone.??But a mile away, a man is killed by that bullet as he innocently repairs his roof.??And Michael keeps desperately silent while he watches his world crumble.

Meanwhile Jenna, the dead man's daughter, copes with desperation of her own.??Through her grief, she tries to understand why she no longer feels comfortable with her boyfriend and why a near stranger named Michael keeps appearing in her dreams.

Suspenseful and powerfully moving, this is the unforgettable story of an accidental crime and its haunting web of repercussions.

Joyce McDonald is the author of several critically acclaimed young adult and middle-grade novels, including Shades of Simon Gray, an Edgar Allan Poe Award nominee and an ALA Best Book for Young Adults, and Devil on My Heels, nominated for five state awards. She is also a poet and is on the faculty of the low-residency MFA in writing program at Spalding University in Louisville, Kentucky. She lives in Forks Township, Pennsylvania, with her husband. Visit Joyce at joycemcdonald.net.