Reviews
- The Chicago Tribune
“Like a great album — Parsons' Grievous Angel, let's say — Lonesome Lies Before Us is both a collection of brilliantly realized moments and a work that transcends the sum of its parts. There are no minor observations in this novel, no scenes that don't matter. In the end, the depth of feeling attained by the exceptionally sensitive Lee lingers, inspiring more spins through his songlike prose. A novel more full of life, musical and other, is hard to imagine.” —Lloyd Sachs, The Chicago Tribune
- The Washington Post
“If Lonesome Lies Before Us isn’t the best American novel of the year, it’s one of the most American American novels. It’s intensely concerned with the civic institutions that shape everyday lives, and with who’s affected when they disappear. That’s too much weight for the average country song to bear, but Lee’s novel carries it just fine.” —Mark Athitakis, The Washington Post
- The Wall Street Journal
“Mr. Lee plucks familiar chords with a sure hand, glancing on themes of grief, jealousy and second chances ... But what really stamps this book on the heart is Yadin’s vulnerable spiritual journey from loneliness toward something like grace.” —Sam Sacks, The Wall Street Journal
- The Awl
"The lives and circumstances Lee outlines seem harrowingly dismal in the abstract, so the novel’s greatest triumph is the dignity he grants them. They’re believably average people with believably average relationships of the sort most novels would reasonably bypass." —Pete Tosiello, The Awl
- Paste Magazine
"Like a beat-up guitar case, Yadin has flaws for all to see. But in Lee’s genuine portrait of struggle and persistence, there’s plenty of magic inside." —Eric Swedlund, Paste Magazine
- The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
"In a remarkable sequence, Park happens upon a lecture about Gerard Manley Hopkins in the local library, and becomes fascinated with both Hopkins' highly compressed poetry and life as a Catholic convert and Jesuit priest. (English teachers: Get the pages here on Hopkins' "Pied Beauty" into your classroom packets.) Park's spiritual quest will take him in unusual directions." —Jim Higgins, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
- Interview Magazine
“Lonesome Lies Before Us is a tale of heartbreak, love, and failure that will keep sounding in your head long after final page.” —Jeff Vasishta, Interview
Magazine
- The Woven Tale Press
“Don Lee’s fourth novel is a masterpiece.…This is high-stakes, adventurous storytelling. And whether we call it “alt-fiction” or not, Lee’s novel belongs in a class with those of Yates, Salter, and Ford.” —DeWitt Henry, The Woven Tale Press
- Shelf Awareness
“Lonesome Lies Before Us may sound like a hokey country weeper, but Lee is a master of the everyday. He cuts as close to the bone as possible without leaving a puddle of maudlin blood on the floor.…This is a love story with all the regrets and slender hopes one inevitably carries into old age.” —Bruce Jacobs, Shelf Awareness
- Kirkus Reviews
“Lee’s evocative descriptions of the inner lives of ordinary men and women are subtly devastating.…It’s not high drama, but as a sad, sweet portrait of a couple trying to come to terms with their own imperfections, it’s awfully compelling.” —Kirkus Reviews
- Library Journal
“With wit and humor, Lee pens a touching meditation on the obstacles, hindrances, and snags one encounters in the pursuit of being an artist.” —Joshua Finnell, Library Journal
- Booklist
“This is a very knowing novel, as credible about carpeting as it is about music but also about Meniere's disease, the hotel business, and much else, all figuring in the story and all carefully described.” —Booklist
Blurbs
In Don Lee's wonderfully lyrical novel, all sorts of beautiful losers love and leave, burn out and fade away, try to make something out of nothing, and drift apart even as they come together. There is faded glory here, making Lonesome Lies Before Us a kind of allegory for the faded dream of America itself.
—Marlon James, author of A Brief History of Seven Killings
I always look forward to and am never disappointed in a Don Lee book. Lonesome Lies Before Us is no exception. A master of detail and understatement, he explores the inner solitude of his characters like a spelunker in a massive cave, revealing beauty with a single piercing light.
—Viet Thanh Nguyen, author of The Sympathizer
—Jaimy Gordon, author of The Lord of Misrule
Don Lee is one of the most emotionally attuned writers I've ever read. His characters seem like people you know and love, people from your past you've lost and wish you hadn't. He makes you fall in love with the kind of people you might never even notice if you saw them on the street, on the subway, on a bus, in the hallway of a hotel. In these times, more than ever, this kind of writing is heroic.
—Brad Watson, author of Miss Jane
Like a great country song, Lonesome Lies Before Us overflows with the sadness and sweetness of real life. Don Lee’s wonderful novel is a grown-up love story that lingers in the memory.
—Tom Perrotta, author of Little Children
What I love about Don Lee’s work is that you can always feel its intelligence. This novel is about the divide between the intellect and the heart, and the outside forces that impinge, regardless of desire or determination. I suppose we all have an image of our ideal selves. This is not so much about that as about what we gain when we relinquish the impossible, or at least the unachievable. It’s not a downer, in any way: it’s about hope and flexibility, a unique love song in a minor key.
—Ann Beattie, author of The State We’re In: Maine Stories
We think the world is explored, discovered until we read such an account as Don Lee's Lonesome Lies Before Us, in which unsung heartbreak gets writ down and copyrighted. There is no warm center here. There are minute details of life after unplanned life. These are details that don't make it out of one's bubble, normally, much less into another's. I am grateful that Mr. Lee has found these lives on earth and in his head and made of these lives such a resonant account.
—Will Oldham, a.k.a. Bonnie “Prince” Billy