The Carnivore: A Novel

When Hurricane Hazel tore through Toronto on October 15, 1954, it left its mark on both the city and its inhabitants. In the aftermath, a young cop named Ray Townes emerges as a hero--numerous accounts detail the way he battled the raging Humber River to save those trapped in their homes--and his story is featured prominently in the newspapers, thrusting him into the spotlight as a local celebrity. Meanwhile, his wife Mary is wrestling with doubts about her husband's heroism. While performing her own miracles the night of the storm as a nurse at a mud-filled, overcrowded emergency room, Mary met a woman-disoriented and near death-with a disturbingly peculiar recollection of events. While Mary tries to shake her suspicions about Ray as they rebuild their life in the shell-shocked city, she can't help but wonder about her husband and that fateful night. When a reporter comes knocking 50 years later to revisit that horrendous night, the truth begins to surface and threatens to destroy them.