Jaclyn Gilbert’s piercing and lyrically compelling debut novel about marriage, loss, and finding the path home again. Murray has always known how to suppress his pain. In the shadows of a predawn run, a man tries to escape what he can’t control: His failed marriage. Grief. Even his own weakness.
Murray is a college running coach insistent on his relentless training regimen and obsessed with his star athlete - until he finds her crumpled and unresponsive during a routine practice one morning.
Unable to avoid or outrun reality, Murray is forced to face the consequences of a terrible accident from the past…and his own increasingly tenuous grip on life. In her debut novel, author Jaclyn Gilbert weaves together the strands of two lives that form a union as finely nuanced and delicate as a spider’s web - and just as vulnerable.
Following the relationship of Murray and his ex-wife, Nancy, in alternating narratives, we experience their early moments of hope and desire as well as their fears and failings. With poignancy and grace, Late Air traces the collapse of a marriage, exhausted by time and trauma, and one couple’s journey to regain their footing.