About The Bully of Order
• Hardcover: 400 pages
• Publisher: Harper (September 2, 2014)
Washington Territory, 1886
Jacob and Nell Ellstrom step from ship to shore and are struck dumb by the sight of their new home—the Harbor, a ragged township of mud streets and windowless shacks. In the years to come this will be known as one of the busiest and most dangerous ports in the world, and with Jacob’s station as the only town physician, prosperity and respect soon rain down on the Ellstroms. Then their son, Duncan, is born, and these are grand days, busy and full of growth. But when a new physician arrives, Jacob is revealed as an impostor, a fraud, and he flees, leaving his wife and son to fend for themselves.
Years later, on a fated Fourth of July picnic, Duncan Ellstrom falls in love. Her name is Teresa Boyerton, and her father owns the largest sawmill in the Harbor. Their relationship is forbidden by class and by circumstance, because without Jacob there to guide him, Duncan has gone to work for Hank Bellhouse, the local crime boss. Now, if Duncan wants to be with Teresa, he must face not only his past, but the realities of a dark and violent world and his place within it.
Told from various points of view, Brian Hart’s novel follows the evolution of the Harbor from a mudstamp outpost to a city that rivals the promise of San Francisco. The Bully of Order is a meditation on progress, love, and identity; a spellbinding novel of fate and redemption—told with a muscular lyricism and filled with a cast of characters Shakespearean in scope—where everyone is as much at the mercy of the weather as they are of the times.
Praise for The Bully of Order
“Hart’s sense of place is brilliant…There are dazzling characterizations…[and] a dense, deep and illuminating narrative…of greed and ambition and of fathers and sons…Think the brutal realities of McCarthy’s Blood Meridian set among the primeval forests of the Pacific Northwest frontier.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“An epic novel of violence, depravity, and mayhem…Brian Hart writes like Cormac McCarthy in overdrive. What talent, what nerve, what a wondrous and spellbinding book. The Bully of Order is part creation myth, part apocalyptic thriller, and it’s peopled with charlatans, swindlers, and murderers who will haunt your dreams.” —John Dufresne, author of No Regrets, Coyote
Purchase Links
Amazon | IndieBound | Barnes & Noble
About Brian Hart
A native of Idaho, Brian Hart won the Keene Prize for Literature from the University of Texas at Austin and received an MFA from the Michener Center for Writers there. He is the author of the novel Then Came the Evening. He lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife and young daughter.
Connect with Brian through his website.
Brian’s Tour Stops
Tuesday, September 2nd: M. Denise C.
Wednesday, September 3rd: missris
Thursday, September 4th: Reading Reality
Friday, September 5th: Book Loving Hippo
Monday, September 8th: Cerebral Girl in a Redneck World
Thursday, September 18th: Mom in Love With Fiction
Friday, September 19th: Broken Teepee
Monday, September 22nd: No More Grumpy Bookseller
Tuesday, September 30th: Sun Mountain Reviews
Thursday, October 9th: Jo-Jo Love to Read!