Before I Knew Him

by Anna Ralph (Author)

• Used

  Hardcover
  2008

  $3.46

  Before I knew him, when he was still a collection of movements and mannerisms I observed from a distance, when he had no history, no future that I could guess, that is the time I'd have back. Then, he was a boy, like me, though nothing like me. Perhaps it was that, the difference, which drew me to him. But something else, too, more powerful, like the pull of the tide that sucks pebbles back to the sea...Leo Fisch is a young man with a brilliant future ahead of him. He is bright, sociable and on the verge of moving in with his beautiful girlfriend, Kathryn. Outwardly, at least, he seems happy. Then when a sinister discovery is made in a forest near Leo's home town, a figure from childhood re-enters his life.David Caldwell is tough and aggressive; the very opposite of the company Leo now keeps. Unlikely friends, they are bound by a shared summer - and a shared secret - they had promised to forget. As past and present begin to close in, the comfortable life Leo has created for himself starts to unravel. Their terrible truth begins to emerge and Leo must confront not only the awkward, fragile boy he once was, but the events of that summer which threaten to destroy them both...

• Used

  Paperback
  2008

  $3.46

  In the hottest summer for years, the long school holidays stretch out before fourteen-year-old Leo. But he doesn't see much to look forward to. Leo doesn't fit in. But nothing ever happens to Leo; he never has a story. Then he meets David. Moody, resentful and tough, David is everything Leo is not and an unlikely friendship soon grows between them.
  Events that summer take a dangerous and disturbing turn, and the results are devastating for both boys and their friendship. In the aftermath, traumatized, they pledge to keep their shared secret, never to meet again, and above all -- to forget. But when the terrible truth re-emerges ten years later and forces David and Leo back together, everything and nothing has changed.

  From the Hardcover edition.