With her sophomore effort entitled How to Survive a Natural Disaster, Margaret Hawkins offers the reader a meditation on family, faith, and redemption.  Given the subject matter, one shouldn’t expect a Nicholas Sparks clone or some other emotionally exploitive trash that usually lines the shelves of bookstores and tops bestseller lists.  The novel is about redemption, but it is a strange and dark redemption, more Dexter than The Notebook.  Through the prism of multiple voices, Hawkins reveals a family in turmoil and a traumatic event that shatters the numbing dysfunction.  (The cover displays a young child, teddy bear in hand, … Continue reading How to Survive a Natural Disaster by Margaret Hawkins