Michael Cunningham — The Snow Queen

Fourth Estate 2014 Paperback, 258pp. It's November 2004. Barrett Meeks, having lost love yet again, is walking through Central Park when he is suddenly and inexplicably inspired to look up at the sky, where he sees a pale, translucent light that seems to regard him in a distinctly godlike way. Although Barrett doesn't believe in visions - or in god, for that matter - he can't deny what he's seen. At the same time, in the not-quite-gentrified Bushwick neighborhood of Brooklyn, Beth, who's engaged to Barrett's older brother,Tyler, is dying of colon cancer. Foxing to the edges of pages. (ISBN: 9780007557783). Good.