Lark Ascending

To escape the flames of religious nationalism as well as literal, climate-induced wildfires, Lark and his family are forced to flee farther and farther north, to the Maine woods. Eventually it becomes clear that nowhere in America or elsewhere on earth is safe—not even Ireland, the last place rumored to be accepting refugees. After a brutal trans-Atlantic voyage ends in shipwreck, Lark has to run for his life. Along the way, he stumbles on two equally lost and desperate souls: one of the last remaining dogs, who becomes his closest companion, and a fierce older woman in search of her lost son. The three of them form a makeshift family and attempt to reach Glendalough, a place they believe is the Promised Land.

Lark Ascending is a moving story of friendship and bravery that also serves as a warning of what is likely to come if we fail to protect our environment and our personal freedoms. It’s likely to appeal to fans of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and Omar El Akkad’s American War and What Strange Paradise.

Born in Corbin, Kentucky, Silas House is the bestselling author of seven novels, including The Coal Tattoo, Southernmost and Lark Ascending. Along with Jason Howard, he also wrote Something’s Rising: Appalachians Fighting Mountaintop Removal. His work has been recognized with the Duggins Prize (the largest for an LGBTQ writer in the country), the Southern Book Prize for Fiction, the E.B. White Award, the Lee Smith Award, the Caritas Medal, and the Hobson Medal. Mr. House teaches at Berea College and currently serves as the Poet Laureate of Kentucky.

“Hope is such an essential part of survival,” says Silas House, in this conversation about Lark Ascending.

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Join us

Silas House will be at Colgate on Thursday, Oct. 19, at 4:30 p.m. EDT. Join us physically in the Persson Hall auditorium or register to join us virtually via Zoom. The in-person audience will be able to participate in a post-reading Q&A and book-signing. Everyone is welcome. Admission is free.

Want to find out what thoughtful readers are saying about Lark Ascending? Join Colgate faculty and students on Monday, Oct. 30, from 7-8 p.m. EDT for a conversation about all three October Living Writers books. (No preparation is required.) Register here.

Go beyond the book

We’re putting the coolest thing first! A music journalist as well as fiction writer, Silas House created this Spotify list to accompany your reading of Lark Ascending.
“Adrenaline runs through every page,” writes Jennette Holzworth in the Southern Review.
“There’s necessary violence and necessary kindness,” says Silas House, in this Nashville Public Television interview about Lark Ascending.
“I think it’s a literary novel that happens to star a gay man.” Listen to Silas House in this short Storytellers’ Studio interview for Pride Month.
“Heaven and earth, the Celtic saying goes, are only three feet apart, but in thin places that distance is even shorter.” For more on thin places, like the Glendalough of Lark Ascending, read this New York Times travel article.
Here is the full text of George Meredith’s poem, “The Lark Ascending.”