Cloudmaker by Brooks, Malcolm

From the author of the national bestseller Painted Horses, a novel set during the Age of Aviation, in which a young tinkerer and an aspiring pilot building their own airplane unexpectedly come into possession of a rare Lindbergh flight watch owned by a bank robber whose fellow criminals want it back.

From the nationally bestselling author of Painted Horses, Malcolm Brooks returns with a soaring, spirited novel set during the summer of Amelia Earhart's final flight--a tale of American ingenuity and optimism set against the backdrop of a deepening Great Depression.

The summer of 1937 will be a turning point for fourteen-year-old Houston "Huck" Finn. When he and a friend find a dead body in a local creek, a rare Lindbergh flight watch on its wrist, it seems like a sign. Huck is building his own airplane, a fact he has concealed from his mother. That summer also marks the arrival of his cousin Annelise, sent to live with the family under mysterious circumstances. As it turns out, she has had flying lessons--another sign. As Huck's airplane takes shape, so does his burgeoning understanding of the world, including the battle over worldliness vs. godliness that has split Annelise from her family, and, in a quieter way, divides Huck's family too. And meanwhile, there's the matter of the watch, which it turns out the dead man's cohort of bank robbers would very much like back.

In Brooks' trademark "lush, breathtaking prose" (San Francisco Chronicle on Painted Horses) and with a winking nod to the Sam Clemens who inspired its hero's nickname, Cloudmaker is a boisterous, heartfelt novel that brings to life the idealism, inventiveness, traditionalism, and deep contradictions of the American spirit.

Author: Malcolm Brooks
Publisher: Grove Press
Published: 03/09/2021
Pages: 400
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.30lbs
Size: 9.30h x 5.90w x 1.60d
ISBN: 9780802127051

Review Citation(s):
Library Journal Prepub Alert 10/01/2020 pg. 49
Publishers Weekly 11/23/2020
Kirkus Reviews 12/15/2020
Library Journal 02/01/2021 pg. 77
Booklist 02/15/2021 pg. 30
Shelf Awareness 03/19/2021

About the Author

Malcolm Brooks was raised in the rural foothills of the California Sierras. A carpenter by trade, he has lived in Montana for most of two decades. His writing has appeared in Gray's Sporting Journal, Outside, Sports Afield, and Montana Quarterly, among others.