What a great book! I’m not alone in thinking this, either: since FOURTH OF JULY CREEK was published in 2014, it has won numerous awards.

But, right up front, I want to say I have two issues with this book: its genre and its title.

I do not agree with the genre the book is classified under (at least at my library), Mystery and Suspense. To call it that is a stretch. Although part of FOURTH OF JULY CREEK wonders what became of a family, that is only a part. The book is literature more than it is mystery and suspense.

And FOURTH OF JULY CREEK is about more than Fourth of July Creek.

The book centers on Pete Snow, a social worker in Montana. Fourth of July Creek has to do with one of his cases that begins with the discovery of a filthy and somewhat wild boy, Benjamin Pearl, who lives in the wilderness with his father, Jeremiah, a paranoid man, suspicious of everyone, always afraid that his freedom is threatened.

Pete seeks to gain their trust so they will accept his help and, in so doing, learns the Pearl family also consists of a wife and several more children. Where are they?

But that is just one of Pete’s cases featured in FOURTH OF JULY CREEK. Also, issues in his own life make up half the book, with a runaway daughter who resorts to prostitution because she thinks she is maintaining her freedom and a brother who is evading prison.

All the parts of FOURTH OF JULY CREEK, Pete's social work and his personal issues, have in common the desire for freedom.

Smith Henderson is an author I’ll be watching for. His writing is brilliant, a word that may be overused but, in this case, is applicable.