Morning: A Novel

by W.D. Wetherell

When Alec Brown, a middle-aged biographer, takes as his subject broadcasting pioneer Alec McGowan, host of television’s very first wake-up show, “Morning,” the project is marked by a sinister obsession. For intertwined with McGowan’s life and the birth of the box is Brown's own family history. His estranged father, Chet Standish, was not only McGowan's best friend and "Morning" cohost, he was also the man who shot and killed McGowan on the air. Now dying of cancer, Standish is being released from prison into his son's care.

W. D. Wetherell weaves together the story of McGowan's rise to television notoriety–back when the medium, and indeed the nation, seemed ripe with promise–and Brown's tenuous steps to better understand the love triangle that drove his father to violence. Morning is at once a riveting glimpse of an era gone by, a moving portrait of a family in turmoil, and a penetrating reflection on the rise of mass media.

Genres: Fiction

384 pages, Paperback

First published April 24, 2001

About the author

Walter D. Wetherell is the author of eleven previous works of fiction and nonfiction. He has received two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, two O. Henry Awards, the Drue Heinz Literature Prize, and, most recently, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Strauss Living Award. He lives in Lyme, New Hampshire, with his wife and two children. His latest novel is A Century of November.

Reviews

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fantastically excellent writer -- I'm excited to check out his other work. This particular book was a 5 star read for me until about 3/4 in, when it got a little disturbing and a little trippy. The ship righted itself in the end, but by then the spell was broken for me, sadly.

[Levi Cochran · Rating 1 out of 5]

The book is extremely slow and choppy with very poor imagery. It's almost impossible to keep up with whose perspective that each paragraph is coming from.

[Tuck · Rating 2 out of 5]

i thought this would be really good, but i didn't like the writing.

[ACRL]

Read by ACRL Member of the Week Clay Williams. Learn more about Clay on the ACRL Insider blog.

[Kathleen · Rating 1 out of 5]

Only took 15 days to read this book....all suffering. I so wish I hadn't kept on reading this when I was bored with it on page 5. The story idea is a good one, just not written well.