Ask a Bookseller: ‘We Burned So Bright’ by TJ Klune

About this episode

Rachel Ostrom discusses TJ Klune's novel 'We Burned So Bright' and its themes surrounding the end of the world and personal connections.

On The Thread’s Ask a Bookseller series, we talk to independent booksellers all over the country to find out what books they’re most excited about right now. Rachel Ostrom of Acorn Bookshop in St. Paul says TJ Klune’s new novel “We Burned So Bright” might make you cry. Klune is author of charming and hopeful New York Bestselling fantasies “The House in the Cerulean Sea ” and “Under the Whispering Door,” among several others. This new stand-alone novel has a starker premise than some of Klune’s other works: the end of the world. A black hole has been gobbling up the solar system, and in a month’s time, life on Earth will end. Faced with a clear deadline, husbands Don and Rodney take a road trip across the U.S. to reach an important destination before time runs out. On the way, Ostrom says, they encounter memorable characters with their own varied responses to the end of life on earth. She describes one memorable conversation Rodney and Don have around a campfire with a younger couple, where they recall a previous catastrophic experience: “When they were first together, it was in the 80s, in the midst of the AIDS crisis. They're talking about their friends who died during the AIDS…

People in this episode

Guest: Rachel Ostrom

Topics covered

• book recommendations
• end of the world
• road trip
• AIDS epidemic
• independent booksellers

Keywords

• TJ Klune
• We Burned So Bright
• AIDS crisis
• independent booksellers
• road trip
• end of the world

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: We Burned So Bright, The House in the Cerulean Sea, Under the Whispering Door

Places: St. Paul, U.S.

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