Reservation Road

On a warm summer evening, the Learners of a quiet Connecticut town (Ethan, Grace, and their children Josh and Emma) pull into a gas station after a concert. Ten-year-old Josh has drifted into his own thoughts and is standing near the roadside when a speeding car rounds the curve and strikes him. He dies at once, and the driver does not stop.

The novel is built around the coming collision between two very different men. The driver is Dwight Arno, a small-town lawyer who badly needs another chance in life. He is also a father, and his ten-year-old son was asleep in the car that night. Dwight now has to choose between escaping what he has done and facing the consequences.

Ethan, a well-regarded literature professor at a small New England college, sees his carefully ordered life broken in an instant, but he refuses to give up on finding the stranger responsible. The story also follows eight-year-old Emma, who cannot shake the belief that her brother's death was her fault, and Grace, who has to summon the strength to hold her family together and to be the mother Emma needs. The book was adapted into a 2007 film starring Mark Ruffalo, Joaquin Phoenix, and Jennifer Connelly.