"A unique novel of smalltown America that begins with an explosion so wonderfully described you won't be able to put the book down. Karen Osborn combines considerable literary gifts with a storyteller's skills to produce the unforgettable Centerville."
Anita Shreve, author of Resistance, The Weight of Water, and Rescue

“It’s the summer of 1967; the news is awash with race riots and the escalating war in Vietnam. In the aftermath of a brutal and premeditated act of violence, the residents of a somnolent American town find themselves in a new world full of menace and fear. Karen Osborn’s deeply affecting novel Centerville keeps the incomprehensibility of evil always in focus, as her characters - young, old, brave, cowardly, driven by doubt, and committed to faith - struggle to find a way back to the innocence they once took for granted. In this subtle, beautifully written novel, the reader can almost hear the gates of paradise slamming closed on the American dream.”      
Valerie Martin is the author of nine novels, including Trespass,Mary Reilly, Italian Fever, and Property, three collections of short fiction, and a biography of St. Francis of Assisi, titled Salvation.

Jacquelyn Mitchard, author of The Deep End of the Ocean