The LifeguardThe Lifeguard

"In the town of Mission Hills, Michigan, an elementary school child drowns in the Olympic-sized pool at a summer swim club. By most, but not all, the lifeguard on duty that afternoon--a teenage girl who becomes the town's scapegoat, bearing the weight of their grief and fears--is seen as responsible for the tragedy. Kasischke weaves together overlapping narratives and shifting perspectives, gradually peeling back the layers of what really happened that day. Through poetic, sensory-rich prose, she explores the liminal spaces between memory and reality, innocence and culpability, childhood and adulthood. The story probes the arbitrary, inexorable nature of fate--how a single moment can alter lives forever, and how the search for answers can reveal unsettling truths about ourselves and those around us." --