Rainy is a large bear of a man whose wonderful life takes an awful turn, causing him to set out on a journey across Lake Superior in a rebuilt sailboat. He hopes to find answers and possibly happiness once again, all while being pursued by villains and thugs. This novel reads like a classic epic adventure that left me unable to put the book down. Set in a slightly future USA, it was easy to imagine this world to come.

Thanks to NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for the early copy of this book, coming out in April.

I loved loved loved "Peace Like A River". Perhaps one of my favorite books of all time. Leif Enger is a talented writer, and that is evident in this book as well. Rainy is an incredible character- I found myself really rooting for him, and even though this book was character-driven and there were intentional holes of understanding, I still found myself unable to put it down. You never really figure out the details of the dystopian society, and that is okay, because our focus is on Rainy, on Sol, on Lark, on all the lovely characters (even the villans!) who we are introduced to along the way.

A great book for a reader who likes adventure stories, Odyssey-like journeys, character-driven plots.

Set in a dystopian landscape, this is one mans odyssey on a ravaged Lake Superior.
Although often on the brink of despair, the tone remains hopeful , which is why we continue our journey with Rainey. Rainey is on the run , pursued by a dark character that has disrupted his quiet, safe world. Rainey has lost all he loves and somehow continues to trust and seek out others despite the dark underbelly of this new world constantly revealing itself. Is Rainey's survival more likely if he just keeps his head down, probably, but is that real living? In this desperate existence that depends on barter and status and therefore thievery and deception to survive, people still find each other. Those that need to be rescued find each other and hold each other up. We stay with Rainey as he navigates the land and the people, as he "cheerfully refuses" to become what he is surrounded by. and instead chooses faith.

There have been many near future dystopian novels about climate change and the breakdown of social and governmental order but Leif Enger’s contribution reaches the rare level of combining the genre with lyrical writing, thrilling suspense, appealing characters, and a timeless romance. Additionally, Enger’s portrayal of Lake Superior conveys the profound beauty and threat of this vast inland sea. Enger’s characters encounter its fearful power and mesmerizing beauty.

Rainy and Lark live in an isolated and overlooked pocket community while the wider world around them is enmeshed in turmoil. The wealthy few are in control, the working class a kind of indentured servants. Medical research to keep the population compliant occurs on the ‘hospital ships.’ People are choosing death, hopeful for something better. One escapee from this system lands in Rainy’s hometown, on the run, and Lark offers him shelter. The man’s pursuers follow his trail with devastating results.

To save his life, Rainy takes sail on Lake Superior, encountering deadly storms. Stopping at small towns along the coast, he discovers helpful people while others are out for themselves; he visits places of mutual support and those that are raked with division and violence. He picks up a spunky and stowaway girl who seeks her grandfather. But they are stalked by the people who had destroyed Rainy’s life.

Yes, the story sounds horrifying, and there is horror with suicides and murders and corpses floating up from the lake. “What scares me is the notion that we are all one rotten moment, one crushed hope or hollow stomach from stuffing someone blameless in a cage,” Rainy considers.

But Rainy’s deep humanity and love, and the people who work for freedom and offer mutual aid lift the story so that, in the end, you are left with hope. There is still the beauty and wonder of the world, music and art, warmth and safety to be found.

Those familiar with Lake Superior will recognize the landmarks on Rainy’s journey.

Thanks to the publisher for a free book

Longtime Leif Enger fan, and it's interesting to see how his works keep getting darker. This gently written dystopian journey saga is not what I expected from him, but I enjoyed the beautiful prose and compelling characters, even if it did meander a bit.

A dystopian novel with a gentle heart, mostly because this is a book focused on it’s characters, and not using dystopia as a full on plot device. Some of questions about what’s happened may not be answered; that’s not the point. Instead this is a journey towards a different sort of resolution, and I really fell for Rainey as a person. It’s refreshing to have characters who ARE actually just good citizens, but not in a way that’s twee or overdone. They just have the best interests of community at heart. There is sadness here but again, the “journey” trope means there’s also adventure.

For me the real stand out is the prose - it’s so lyrical, very poetic at times, but not too overdone. Because it’s a relatively short book, the fairytale quality of the story AND the writing worked. A lovely tale.

I have been looking for a great futuristic novel but not really overly sci-fi for a class I am teaching. I was needing something futuristic but also heart warming and thrilling. I am so excited to have found that book. This book is beautifully written with a lot of heart. I adored this book and can't wait to have students read this.

It is no secret that my favorite book of all time is Peace Like a River. So, I was very excited to get this ARC of his upcoming. And I won't keep you in suspense, I really enjoyed this one. It is set in a post-apocalyptic world, which gets very dark at times. But I loved that the point of view was the narrator looking back and telling his story. I loved how the setting was grounded in reality in a setting near to my heart, and the narrator goes on quite a journey throughbit . I want to go back and read it again, which I don't do very often. I highly recommend you give this a try when it comes out in April.

Well, he’s done it again. Leif Enger has used his words to create an exciting story filled with great characters and a well told story. I wondered, for a while, what had happened to the country, who is running the government, etc., but after a short time I didn’t care because Rainey’s voyage on Lake Superior was all that mattered. It is a story full of love and fear and friendship and I couldn’t put it down.

Leif Enger returns with a novel with a big twist that takes the reader on a near future adventure around a Lake Superior that becomes a character. The settlements along the shore are changed, often dangerous. Better to know less than more and trust to this author who has demonstrated great heart and care for his characters in earlier books and does so again here.

I tried so hard to finish this book. I just could not stay interested in the storyline. I enjoyed Peace Like a River tremendously, but this story being in the future and too many things being left out....I just Don't enjoy future scenarios like that. Not when you don't have some answers for things. I read until almost the end and just didn't really care what happened after that.

I would classify I Cheerfully Refuse as both a dystopian novel as well as a tale of an epic journey (think: The Odyssey). Set in the near-future on Lake Superior, the places in the novel are largely fictionalized towns and islands. I really loved the first part of the novel when the main character and his wife, Lark, were settled into their somewhat difficult but also rewarding life. I continued to enjoy the writing and movement of the novel but didn't really connect well with the plot. To me, this novel felt like it was on the cusp of what I wanted it to be but fell just short. I appreciated the way the author was quite vague about the future society and left it in a foggy state since the purpose of the novel was not to paint a detailed picture of the future world but instead the impact that was felt upon its people. I have very mixed feelings about the novel but enjoyed reading it.

Absolutely beautiful prose, but a very depressing, fairly dystopic, environment and so I couldn't get myself to finish. Hopefully the end was uplifting.

I Cheerfully Refuse was read because I thought that I would read something about Lake Superior that I could relate to but no I couldn't. I was a deckhand, a second cook, anything I could be on an Ore Boat that sailed the Great Lakes. He named Duluth and Thunder Bay but everything else he made up, I guess it was for the authors prerogative. But he did create Northern Michigan kinda like Houghton. But I'm only arguing a point. The book was fiction and it was. It was an interesting book because it was full of love and patience that filled people with understanding of life. Then it turned to the dark side of human nature. Rainy was the main character and Lark was his wife. Kellan was a drifter and a quick armed bandit kind of guy that paid for a room in their house, the attic. There was a man that Kellan was afraid off, and that was Werryck. It happened after Lark's birthday she noticed her dog was missing and sent Rainy off to find her and then he came back to his house and found his wife dead. His house was trashed and walls were ripped apart. He was given a boat from a friend that died that he helped fix it up. The next day after Lark was killed he escaped in this sail boat as people were shooting at him. You can read the story which is full of scenario's changing what he comes up against. I kind of like the book although I liked real names of places on Lake Superior. I am spoiled.

Wow! 'I Cheerfully Refuse' by Leif Enger is an amazing adventure that took me on a thrilling journey. It's about a musician named Rainy who's feeling really sad after losing his wife who loved selling books. To find her, he sails on a special Lake Superior that seems alive.

The story is full of excitement and surprises! Rainy's search for his lost love becomes a bigger adventure involving many people.

I loved the metaphors and imagery. It paints a vivid picture of a strange world and a powerful message of hope for the future. Magical and inspiring. Truly a gem! I loved the pace it's written at, and the artful language.

Rainey and his wife Lark live simply sometime in the near future on the shores of Lake Superior. Rainey plays bass for a local band and Lark runs a bookshop of sorts where she collects books that have been abandoned in now-shuttered libraries and empty houses. Near the beginning of the story, two seemingly unrelated events turn Rainey’s world upside down: Lark finds a book she has been searching for since her childhood (entitled, aptly, “I Cheerfully Refuse.”) and the couple takes in a boarder who is obviously full of secrets. These events collide to force Rainey to leave his home and go in search of…he’s not exactly sure what. He only knows that he’s being pursued and he needs to escape.

I Cheerfully Refuse is labeled a dystopian novel, because of its setting in a United States whose malignant politics and economics have finally split the very wealthy from the rest of humanity. Although not many details are given, it’s obvious that the rich no longer care about society and everyone else makes do in crumbling communities living with the effects of climate change and shortages of everything from food to clothing. For me, the book falls more into the literary journey genre than a dystopian saga. The details of what happened to make the world the way it is are never fully revealed, and Rainey’s journey across Lake Superior (which, due to climate change, has gobbled up much of its previous shoreline and is now truly an inland sea) becomes more important than the plot.

Once I settled into the literary journey structure, I enjoyed this book much more than I thought I would. This genre is not my favorite; I’ve never been able to get into books like the Lord of the Rings series or The Road - the seeming lack of relationship from one leg of the journey to another frustrates me. But this book was lifted for me by two things: first, it is short enough that the pieces come together before the reader loses interest, and even more importantly, because the leading character is essentially good, and this goodness reflects on every character. Because Rainey cheerfully refuses to give in to despair, we don’t either.

Many thanks to Atlantic Monthly Press and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

What a wonderful tale!!

Set on Lake Superior in a terrifyingly realistic dystopian future, the ice caps have melted and while the government is functional most of humanity seems to live in smallish communities where barter is king. Society is stratified with the government and law working more for the elites than the common man. People are getting by, some through crime and scams others through community. This isn’t necessarily a tale specifically about how the world came to be dystopian or how to fix it, it’s a smaller story set within the world, richly descriptive!

Exploring community connection and grief, Rainier (‘Rainy’) sets sail on Lake Superior following his wife’s death. Pursued by a shadowy figure because of a boarder he and his wife had taken in, he is beset by storms, children and weird and wonderful characters! This story is all journey, if you need concrete plot this is not the tale for you! This book pretty much never went where I was expecting. I thought the ending was near perfect and exactly matched the entirety of the book.

Because it is meandering the middle felt like it was dragging, but it is so beautifully written! My only real issues is that as someone VERY unfamiliar with lake superior I would have appreciated a map of some kind!

It reminded me of playing the Spiritfarer game so I would also suggest this novel if you liked that game.

Many thanks to Grove Atlantic, NetGalley and Leif Enger for the opportunity to read this ARC!

this was just . . . fine, i guess. i didn’t really connect with the story, and it dragged a little at times. i finished it a couple of weeks ago and i honestly don’t even have much to say about it so. yeah.

What a terrific storyteller Leif Enger is! In his novel ‘Peace Like A River’ he wove a perfect tale with larger than life characters you feel you know personally. Not only has he accomplished the same in his latest novel ‘I Cheerfully Refuse’, he’s also added that little element of magic in such a way that enables you to just let him sweep you along for the ride! The misty, stormy sense of place that is Lake Superior, adds to the mystery of this tale of grief under desperate circumstances in the not too distant future. Excellent read!

Unfortunately I just could not connect to this one.

On paper this is right up my alley, an introspective story about overcoming grief, with solid prose and an unlikely father figure plot to boot, however I found myself resolutely lacking the compulsion to keep turning the pages.

Maybe it was the slower pacing of the novel, the ambling plot of the middle section of the book, or the dystopian setting that failed to ever fully explain itself other than a few vague details; but this book was simply okay. I didn’t necessarily hate anything, but more to the point I didn’t really feel anything when reading it either.

A tale of grief and survival set in a future America that struggled to quite hit the emotional beats that it was relying upon.

Thanks to NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!