Advance Praise for Deni Ellis Béchard’s Into the Sun
“Ambitious, elegant, and filled with a kind of ferocious intelligence.”
— Roxana Robinson, author of Sparta
“An intimate portrait of people willing to die for their hungers, consumed by the romance of being narrators and saviors. As they try to find their outermost edges, every act is contemplated, every cruelty somehow unavoidable, and everyone destroyed by what they seek in a land where foreigners are thrilled to be hunted and only natives long to escape. We wake from this book as witnesses to Kabul, to America, and to the crimes of men who need destruction to find definition and women desperate to understand.”
— Benjamin Busch, author of Dust to Dust
“A riveting mystery-thriller that also probes deeper into the nature of war and the ways in which it attracts and transforms some people.”
— David Abrams, author of Fobbit
Praise for Vandal Love
“Béchard has reinvented the generational novel with innovative brilliance.”
— Robert Olen Butler
“Reminiscent of Proulx and Doctorow in both sweep and grace of prose.”
— Dagoberto Gilb
“The word ‘masterpiece’ is not to be used lightly, but one is tempted in the case of Vandal Love. . . . Its muscular use of language conjures a young Faulkner, García Márquez, or Steinbeck.”
— Katherine Min
“Prose that’s both lyrical and gritty, able to evoke big emotions with exquisite intimacy.”
— O, The Oprah Magazine
“Masterful storytelling and heartbreakingly beautiful writing.”
— Loung Ung
Also by Deni Ellis Béchard
Vandal Love
Cures for Hunger
Of Bonobos and Men: A Journey to the Heart of the Congo
All of the events and characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locales are included only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used fictitiously.
© 2016, Text by Deni Ellis Béchard
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical articles or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher: Milkweed Editions, 1011 Washington Avenue South, Suite 300, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55415.
(800) 520-6455
Published 2016 by Milkweed Editions
This edition is printed by special arrangement with House of Anansi Press Inc., and published simultaneously in Canada.
Cover and interior design by Alysia Shewchuk
Cover photo/illustration by Ellerslie / Shutterstock
The text of this book is set in Garamond Premier Pro.
16 17 18 19 20 5 4 3 2 1
First Edition
Special underwriting for this book was contributed by Barry Berg.
Milkweed Editions, an independent nonprofit publisher, gratefully acknowledges sustaining support from the Jerome Foundation; the Lindquist & Vennum Foundation; the McKnight Foundation; the National Endowment for the Arts; the Target Foundation; and other generous contributions from foundations, corporations, and individuals. Also, this activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a Minnesota State Arts Board Operating Support grant, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund, and a grant from the Wells Fargo Foundation Minnesota. For a full listing of Milkweed Editions supporters, please visit www.milkweed.org.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Béchard, Deni Y. (Deni Yvan), 1974- author.
Title: Into the sun: a novel / Deni Ellis Bechard.
Description: First edition. | Minneapolis, Minnesota: Milkweed Editions, 2016.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016013644 (print) | LCCN 2016013702 (ebook) | ISBN 9781571319241 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Kabul (Afghanistan)—Fiction. | BISAC: FICTION / Literary. | FICTION / War & Military.
Classification: LCC PR9199.4.B443 I58 2016 (print) | LCC PR9199.4.B443 (ebook) | DDC 813/.6—dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2016013644
Milkweed Editions is committed to ecological stewardship. We strive to align our book production practices with this principle, and to reduce the impact of our operations in the environment. We are a member of the Green Press Initiative, a nonprofit coalition of publishers, manufacturers, and authors working to protect the world’s endangered forests and conserve natural resources. Into the Sun was printed on acid-free 100% postconsumer-waste paper by Marquis Book Printing.
DENI ELLIS BÉCHARD is the author of the novel Vandal Love, winner of the 2007 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book; Cures for Hunger, a memoir about growing up with his father, who robbed banks; and Of Bonobos and Men, winner of the 2015 Nautilus Book Award for investigative journalism. His work has appeared in numerous magazines and newspapers, including the LA Times, Salon, Pacific Standard, and Foreign Policy, and he has reported from India, Iraq, Colombia, Rwanda, the Congo, and Afghanistan.
Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity. What profit hath a man of all his labor which he taketh under the sun? One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever. The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose. The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits. All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again. All things are full of labor; man cannot utter it: the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing. The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be . . .
— Ecclesiastes
Khorasan is the name by which the Afghans, Baluch, and Brahui designate the region known to Europeans as Afghanistan and Baluchistan. It is a softened pronunciation of Khoresthan, or country of the sun or the place of light . . .
— Edward Balfour, The Cyclopaedia of India and of Eastern and Southern Asia, Volume 2, 1888
Contents
Part 1: Kabul: March 2012
Part 2: Kabul: January/March 2012
Part 3: Louisiana: December 1999–November 2001
Part 4: Kabul: February/April 2012
Part