The Nowhere Child by Christian White

Minotaur Books, 384 pages, $26.99

“The Nowhere Child” begins in Melbourne, Australia, but mostly moves through the town of Manson, Kentucky, and surrounding area. Australian author Christian White bravely tackles small town life in America and snake-handling evangelicals in his debut novel.

Kimberly Leamy is a photography teacher in Melbourne. Her life isn’t totally satisfying, but there she is and there you have it. Until. One day a man interrupts her break time between classes. His name is Stu, as it eventually develops. (I don’t know why he bothered with an alias, actually.) He says he has been searching for most of his life for a sister who was taken from his family’s home in Manson, Kentucky, when she was two. And here, in Melbourne, Australia, he thinks he has found her.

Stu presents DNA evidence (what did we ever do before DNA testing!) that he says proves his case. Please fly half-way around the world to a dinky area of the U.S. and meet the rest of your slightly — or perhaps more than slightly, no promises — dysfunctional family, he asks. Together they can all figure out what happened. Why not, says Kim. Anything is better than ennui, loss, and an alcoholic fug.

Kim leaves behind a puzzled stepfather and a half-sister (or so she has always thought) in Melbourne. Kim’s mother died four years earlier, so there is no help untangling her story from that end.

In alternating chapters, author White describes both Kim’s experiences in Kentucky and the kidnapping twenty-eight years previously.

Sammy Went was the name of the toddler who disappeared. Father Jack, we learn almost immediately, had an affair with a neighbor. Mother Molly, although she married into her husband’s evangelical faith, was an ardent supporter of the speak-in-tongues, holy-rolling, snake-handling, save-the-sinners church. Emma, Sammy’s sister, was thirteen and rebellious. Stu was "a lumpy nine-year-old." Their secrets, big and small, come spilling out. Do any of them have to do with Sammy’s disappearance? Maaaaybe.

White does a good job bringing Aussie Kim to life. Her struggle to accept the story of Sammy and her family in the bizarrely different environment than the one she was raised in provides a good basis for the story. I did enjoy the book, but after a major revelation occurs at the end, I had to shake my head. (Why, Dean?)