New York Times best-selling author T. C. Boyle is a recipient of the PEN/Faulkner Award and has been named a finalist for the National Book Award. San Miguel follows two families attempting to forge new futures on an island off Southern California. In 1888, Marantha and her husband, a Civil War veteran, hope that life on the island will restore her failing health, but soon the locale's brutal isolation begins to take its toll. Decades later, Elise and Herbie find fulfillment in San Miguel, but the spectre of WWII threatens to change everything.