A Sudden Light by Garth Stein

This is a story of a logging family in the Pacific Northwest but Sometimes a Great Notion it ain't.  When 13 year old Trevor and his father return to the family estate outside of Seattle, the thing he is most anxious to learn about is the "family curse."  The former grand estate is a shambles but still the home to his aunt and grandfather.  The question that his father is here to help resolve is what to do with Grandpa and what is to be done with the estate.  No surprise - there is little agreement.  But there is an interesting backstory which is revealed in chapters interspersed through the main story - and there is guilt - and there are ghosts - and occasionally some elegantly phrased passages about the old growth forests and our relation to them.