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Winner of the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Prize 2023’A beautifully fearless contemplation’ – S. A. Cosby’A literary crime thriller about belonging and betrayal in rural America’ – Paula HawkinsToya Gardner, a young Black artist from Atlanta, has returned to her ancestral home in the North Carolina mountains to trace her family history and complete her graduate thesis. But when she encounters a still-standing Confederate monument in the heart of town, she sets her sights on something bigger.Meanwhile, local deputies find a man sleeping in the back of a station wagon and believe him to be nothing more than a drifter. Yet a search of the man’s vehicle reveals that he is a high-ranking member of the Klan, and the uncovering of a notebook filled with local names threatens to turn the mountain on end.As two horrific crimes split the county apart to reveal deep and unspoken secrets, an urgent, essential question arises: What do you do when everything you ever believed crumbles away?From award-winning writer David Joy comes a searing new novel about the cracks that form in a small North Carolina community and the evils that unfurl from its centre for fans of Daniel Woodrell, George Pelecanos, WIlliam Boyle and Ozark.PRAISE FOR THOSE WE THOUGHT WE KNEW:'[A] bracing novel . . . both a murder mystery and a deeply intimate story of generational relationships and loss’ – Vanity Fair’An emotionally complex procedural that goes to unexpected places’ – Kirkus Reviews’Spinning the gritty complexities and colors of human nature with beautiful, immersive descriptions of the land, Joy writes both holiness and irreverence with the same weight and care’ – Leesa Cross-Smith, author of Half-Blown Rose’The best novels ask the hard questions and task us to come up with answers. Joy is asking the hardest question and daring us to answer truthfully’ – S.A. Cosby, author of Razorblade Tears and All the Sinners Bleed