Vigil Harbor

Vigil Harbor by Julia Glass is a literary novel set roughly a decade in the future in the fictional coastal town of Vigil Harbor, where architect Austin Kepner designs storm-resistant homes as the community grapples with worsening climate instability and the lingering threat of political violence. His stepson Brecht has recently returned home after narrowly escaping a terrorist attack abroad, and the town's uneasy equilibrium is further disturbed by the arrival of two strangers: a traveller with hidden motives and a widow seeking information about a former lover connected to Austin's past. As these new arrivals collide with the town's residents, long-simmering tensions come to a head in a way that endangers lives and ripples through the community. Told through multiple intertwined perspectives, the novel is an engrossing exploration of vulnerability, desire, and resilience in a changing world.