Colorado rancher Atticus Cody receives word that his wayward younger son, Scott, has committed suicide in Resurrection, Mexico. When Atticus travels south to recover Scott's body, he is puzzled by what he finds there and begins to suspect murder. Illuminating those often obscure chambers of the human heart, Atticus is the story of a father's steadfast and almost unfathomable love for his son, a mystery that Ron Hansen's fiction explores with a passion and intensity no reader will be able to resist. "A superbly written novel... Atticus irrefutably confirms this novelist's awesome gifts." -- "Miami Herald""Mr. Hansen writes vigorously, and like an angel." -- "New York Times Book Review""Astonishing imagery... Hansen's style is so fresh; and he has the ability to make it seem effortless, natural."-- Elmore Leonard Colorado rancher Atticus Cody receives word that his wayward younger son, Scott, has committed suicide in Resurrection, Mexico. When Atticus travels south to recover Scott's body, he is puzzled by what he finds there and begins to suspect murder. Illuminating those often obscure chambers of the human heart, Atticus is the story of a father's steadfast and almost unfathomable love for his son, a mystery that Ron Hansen's fiction explores with a passion and intensity no reader will be able to resist. Ron Hansen is the bestselling author of the novel Atticus (a finalist for the National Book Award), Hitler's Niece , Mariette in Ecstasy , Desperadoes , and Isn't It Romantic? , as well as a collection of short stories, a collection of essays, and a book for children. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award. Ron Hansen lives in northern California, where he teaches at Santa Clara University. Atticus Novel, a By Hansen, Ron Perennial Copyright © 2004 Ron Hansen All right reserved. ISBN: 0060927860 Colorado His name was Atticus Cody. He was sixty-seven years old and a cattleman without cattle, the owner of six oil rigs and four hundred forty acres of high plains and sandhills in Antelope County, Colorado. And Atticus was on One Sock in December weather that was just above zero when he looked up at a coupling on his Lufkin oil jack and caught sight of two white suns in the gray winter sky. Weeds and sage were yellow against the snow and the snow strayed over the geography as though recalling how it was to be water. And just above the nodding horsehead pump were the sun and its exact copy, like the moons of another planet. One Sock champed on his wide spade bit and high-stepped up from a deep patch of snow but otherwise seemed unperplexed. Atticus squinted up at the suns and thought to himself, You have lived sixty-seven years and now you have seen a sundog. At five he did what he always did at five. Atticus cracked the frail pane of ice on the horse-water tank and forked horse silage onto the fresh snow for Pepper and One Sock. He took off his yellow gloves in the tack room and shook chicken-flavored cornmeal into the house cat's tin bowl and watched as Skeezix softly crouched on the floor and crunched hard pellets of food. Crows were pecking at saltine crackers that he had crushed on the kitchen porch, and flits of snow were skewing under the fluttering yard light; and a yellow taxi was heading away from the front of his white two-story house. Atticus hurried out and yelled, "Who's there?" but heard no reply. And by the time he got to the house porch, whoever it was had disappeared. Even his shoe prints were being winnowed away. Atticus replaced the green tarpaulin that had sagged off the gas tank and engine of his old Indian motorcycle, then he looked out at the night and a high plains landscape that was being gently simplified by the snow. His windburnt face was a cinnamon red, ice was on his gray mustache like candle wax, his fair blue eyes watered with cold. Atticus picked up the frozen Denver newspaper and opened the porch door without a key. His forty-year-old son was sitting in his flight jacket on the green wingback chair inside, his hair bleached platinum and his handsome face tanned, just up from Mexico and grinning at his father's astonishment. Scott folded his hands behind his head and said with joy, "Merry Christmas!" Atticus telephoned his firstborn son, but found out from Frank's wife that he was still at a budget-committee hearing at the Colorado state legislature. "You'll have to face me alone then," Scott said. Atticus just smiled and fried pork chops and hash browns in an iron skillet while his son opened a chilled bottle of California wine. Atticus tore up some red lettuce for a salad and when he saw his son holding the fancy electric carving knife heard himself say, "Don't play with that." Like he was fourteen. At supper Atticus talked pleasantly about family and farming and old friends who had died, the funny things that Frank's little Jennifer was saying these days, Frank's fine speec