Hope House

Set in 1980s Kentucky, this striking debut novel is told from inside a treatment home for teens, where lost boys become more than their pasts and discover the transformative power of hope. They came from the streets, the sticks and every place in between. They'd stolen cars, dealt dope and hurt people. They'd been hurt themselves. There's AWOL, who won't stop running away. There's Karvel, who runs the place. There's Damico, Smoove, and Peanut. Their futures promise prison or worse, but for now they've been brought together to live in an old home on a hill and see about getting themselves-and each other-right. Told in chorus through the intersecting lives of a group of teenage boys, Hope House follows its ensemble cast through a five-phase program as they grapple with their pasts and search for the one thing none of them have ever really had: a family. In his deeply honest and soulful debut, Bond crafts a coming-of-age story that sears with the anger and spirit of abandoned youth. For fans of Richard Price and Tobias Wolff, Hope House is a novel about belonging, care, and the desire in all of us to find a home.

Joe Bond grew up around group homes and residential treatment programs in eastern Kentucky. He's been a child-care worker, a copy editor, a security guard at a psychiatric hospital and a research librarian at a law firm in Times Square. For several years he covered mixed martial arts fighting for ESPN and various magazines and newspapers throughout the U.S., Brazil and Japan. He began working on Hope House after his story "Damico" won the Masters Review Short Story Award. He lives in New Orleans.