Michael Kroft

On Herring Cove Road Michael Kroft

A touching novel about a troubled old man and the mutual salvation that follows his accidental friendship with the lonely child of his racist neighbor.

Once an amusing extrovert with a reputation as a prankster, Mr. Rosen is entering his retirement years as a stoic thirty-year converted introvert who has no interest in people, despises change, and is more than content to have his wife navigate his life. Since becoming a practicing introvert, his wife has been the only person in his life, and for the few changes he has had to face, she walked him through them, including the childless couple's recent move to a much smaller home in a middle-class neighborhood where their racist next-door neighbor's pint-sized child, Dewey, addresses him as Mr. Jew.

Mr. Rosen had seen the move coming, and he's very much aware of the enormous change to come that will force him to chart his own life's route. A change that will come in the, hopefully, far-off future; though, he refuses to think about it.

This cozy story of an unlikely friendship offers a roller coaster of emotion as Mr. Rosen's comfortable world begins to implode while on a collision course with the chaotic world of a boy, his troubled mother and vengeful father.