Fabulous Fiction Firsts #19

Mon, 05/08/2006 - 1:46pm by muffy

Dean Bakopoulos whose Please Don't Come Back from the Moon is one of only three first novels selected as one of 100 Notable Books of 2005 by The New York Times.

A Michigan native, Dean set the novel in fictitious Maple Rock, based on a stretch of Michigan Avenue between Lonyo and Livernois (in Detroit), where his family went to church, and the Warrendale neighborhood, where his grandparents lived.

This debut novel is ”A beautifully smart, comic, and moving narrative about the fathers who disappear and the sons who take their place”. (Charles Baxter).

Meet Dean on May 13th at the Ann Arbor Book Festival, Young Writers’ panel. In the meantime, here is Dean’s personal list of recommendations.