One mark of a good book is that it keeps you up all night reading it. But if it’s nearly dawn and the book is closed and you still can’t sleep, the book’s either brilliant or scary as hell. Nicole Helget’s first novel, "The Turtle Catcher,” is both.

The book, released today (Feb. 20) by Owen Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, starts out with a murder as three brothers with guns force a mentally damaged man into a lake. That scene loses its ability to shock quickly: By the end of the book, you’ve watched domestic tragedies unfold, visited both world wars and the Sioux Uprising in Minnesota, observed numerous deaths and contemplated even more corpses, and seen pre-World War I New Germany, Minn., implode because of ethnic fear-mongering and a Main Street financial meltdown that has its origins in overseas war profiteering.

"My husband would say that I have a real knack for identifying the seedy side of life," says the Mankato-based Helget, who made headlines with "The Summer of Ordinary Ways," her controversial 2005 memoir about growing up in rural Minnesota. "My outlook is never overly rosy. And, while I don't consider myself a pessimist, I do consider myself a realist. Books don't always have to be uplifting. Characters don't always have to be redeemed.

"However, I understand that readers who are living in an economy that's tanking and in a country that's engaged in two wars maybe need something more than more bad news. So, to them, I hope I offer some humor and small moments of redemptive acts and forgiveness."

Thank you for that. And for the writing, which is so beautifully done that it’s hard to look away, even when Helget’s words describe the most grievous brutality, both real and fiction. The book is pure fairy tale at times, magic and evil all at once.

"While I was working on 'The Turtle Catcher,' which is set at the onset of World War I, the United States was again engaged in wars. And I was dazzled by how quickly masses of people could be convinced of a really stupid idea. And I was equally amazed at how quickly we labeled people who objected or simply asked ‘what the hell is going on’ as traitors or unpatriotic. So, the parallels between the mood of the book and the mood of the culture in which I was working are purposeful," she says.

Helget won Minnesota Monthly’s Tamarack Award with the book's first chapter (read it here), which ran with a warning: "This is a story for adult readers." Perhaps her memoir should have come with a warning as well; her relatives vehemently dispute the veracity of its unhappy and bloody incidents.

But the writer and Mankato State University writing teacher doesn’t have time to worry about other people’s memories; she has five children, the youngest of whom is a baby. That means she doesn’t have time for the kind of daily, disciplined writing habit most writers swear by. Instead, she’s working out her next novel in her head. "When the time is right, I'll write it down. Those writing times, the ones that come after a long dry spell, are wonderful. I feel the muse kissing me on the forehead."

Helget will read at Magers & Quinn at 7:30 p.m. March 5; 612-822-4611.