First published 2023
Tom Lowe built his family's dream home with his own hands. He worked extra hours to pay the adjustable rate mortgage, convinced every sacrifice served his wife and son's happiness. Then he falls from a roof during a shingling job, a split second of tired inattention in blazing sunlight. The constant pain leads to painkiller addiction. His relationships with his wife and son crumble. Tom realizes he can never work again. If he's not a working man, who is he? He ends up in subsidized housing alongside neighbors he once looked down on. Desperation drives him to convenience check fraud and stealing his banker's trash. His world now includes Trina, a struggling single mother who sells her plasma for money, Dawn who runs the local hair salon, and Jamie, a college student eager to fight the system. Tom must discover whether he can reconnect his hands and heart, find self acceptance beyond pride, and become someone who gives rather than just takes.
Genres: domestic-fiction, addiction, contemporary, family-drama
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: redemption, second-chance
Setting: Subsidized Housing
312 pages · Kindle Edition · W. W. Norton & Company
Content warnings: addiction, depression, substance-abuse