Dwelling Places is an ode to rural America that not even this native New Yorker and atheist can resist. From the very first sentence, WrightÕs fictionalized Iowa town, courtesy of her strikingly vivid descriptions, immediately draws the reader into the story. The book is set against a backdrop of cornstalk-lined country roads and brilliant sunsets, in sharp contrast to the lives of her characters, which are anything but idyllic.

The novel centers on the Barneses, a family whose roots in Beulah, Iowa run deep and tragic. The telling is a definite family affair, as Wright narrates the tale from the points of view of four family members. She crafts a beautiful mosaic of a narrative, with each of the main characters bringing their own personal perspective to the table. There is Rita, the family matriarch who has lost both a son and a husband to farming; Mack, her remaining son, who is wrestling with a bout of depression that nearly drove him to suicide; Jodie, MackÕs wife, who struggles to keep her marriage and family together; and Kenzie, Mack and JodieÕs teenage daughter, who becomes an increasingly devout Christian in order to deal with the forces that threaten to tear her family apart. Each voice, being penned by the same author, retains some of WrightÕs engaging signature style, without falling into the trap of sounding overly similar to each other. It is an approach that lends itself especially well to a shared familial tale; all of them tied together by genes and mutual experiences, but still separate individuals onto themselves.

Spiritual themes also abound in the text, with each chapter beginning with a quoted snippet of a traditional hymn. Flying in the face of popular Red-state stereotypes, some members of the Barnes family have taken stances on Christianity that are less than orthodox in some cases, and outright blasphemous in others.

Ironically, Dwelling Places is a story of transition and the process of letting go just as much as it is an account of a tightly-knit family and their home. Wright's work illustrates, in a surprisingly non-clichˇd manner, that while a shared history can be a beautiful thing, the truly important and difficult work lies in building a shared future together.