Stephenie Harrison

FictionDebut Fiction

A lush estate hides dark secrets

Review by Stephenie Harrison

Is there a better setting for a mystery with a whiff of the supernatural than an English country manor house? From Thornfield Hall to Manderley, literature is replete with spooky old homes: places that pulse with untold dangers, where secrets and horrors from the past whisper from the shadows. 

The eponymous estate in Eve Chase’s debut novel, Black Rabbit Hall, is one such place, though this wasn’t always the case. During the 1960s, it was the Cornish holiday home of the Alton family. Under the watchful eye of their beloved mother, children Amber, Toby, Barney and Kitty would spend lazy summers and school holidays reveling in the pursuits of childhood. But in the present day, the house sits shuttered. To stave off financial ruin, its owner has agreed to rent out the property for weddings, which brings Lorna Smith and her fiance to its gates. Although Black Rabbit Hall is entirely unsuitable for entertaining, Lorna is immediately captivated by the place and can’t shake the feeling that she has visited it before. Curiosity turns into obsession, and Lorna soon finds herself desperate to uncover Black Rabbit Hall’s tragic history.

Chase’s pacing and world-building are excellent, thoroughly setting the scene and bringing her characters to life. There is a dreamy quality to the writing that gives the novel the tenor of a Gothic fairy tale, and although there is a sense of malice and danger that thrums beneath it all, Chase’s achingly beautiful investigation of her characters’ inner lives results in a story that is haunting rather than scary. For fans of Kate Morton and Daphne du Maurier, Black Rabbit Hall is an obvious must-read, but it is sure to please any reader who delights in devilishly thrilling dramas.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Is there a better setting for a mystery with a whiff of the supernatural than an English country manor house? From Thornfield Hall to Manderley, literature is replete with spooky old homes: places that pulse with untold dangers, where secrets and horrors from the past whisper from the shadows.
FictionDebut Fiction

An island’s terrible beauty

Review by Stephenie Harrison

Thirty miles off the coast of California sit the Farallon Islands. To visit them is to feel as though one has cast aside the constraints—and comforts—of civilization. At best, these shores of shale and rock have been ungenerous to humans trying to eke out a living; at worst, they have proven deadly. 

In Abby Geni’s dazzling debut, The Lightkeepers, a young photographer named Miranda joins a small band of biologists who study the birds, sharks and whales that migrate annually to the islands to mate and spawn and, in some cases, die. Though her integration into the group is far from seamless, Miranda finds herself connecting with the bleak and barren beauty of her surroundings. However, when an act of unspeakable violence is perpetrated, it unleashes a cycle of destruction and devastation that not all of them will survive.

With The Lightkeepers, Geni has crafted a novel filled with wide-open spaces and also a creeping claustrophobia. The setting takes on the role of a character, and the Farallons are masterfully brought to life on the page through Geni’s luminous prose. There is a soothing, hypnotic quality to Geni’s writing—and an unexpected tenderness, too, one that belies the thick sense of malice and increasing sense of dread that swirls about Miranda’s island home. Though some of the plot points are predictable, the story is rife with satisfying surprises, in large part because of the successful air of uncertainty that surrounds Miranda’s narration. Riveting from beginning to end, The Lightkeepers is unsettling in all the best ways.

 

This article was originally published in the January 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Thirty miles off the coast of California sit the Farallon Islands. To visit them is to feel as though one has cast aside the constraints—and comforts—of civilization. At best, these shores of shale and rock have been ungenerous to humans trying to eke out a living; at worst, they have proven deadly.
FictionHistorical Fiction

A domestic twist on the spy thriller

Review by Stephenie Harrison

One of fiction’s greatest powers is its ability to allow writers and readers the opportunity to examine the question of “What if?” In The Hours Count, Jillian Cantor revisits a pivotal moment in American history and asks: What if Ethel and Julius Rosenberg—the only Americans to ever be executed for spying during the Cold War—were actually innocent?

To explore this idea, Cantor transports readers back to the time of Truman and Eisenhower, an era when fears of smallpox and atomic bombs ran rampant and all things Russian were eyed with deep suspicion. Here we meet Millie Stein, mother to a young son named David who refuses to speak and a Russian husband whom she does not love. Due to David’s unusual behavior, Millie is rejected by the other mothers in her neighborhood and made to feel that his issues are the result of her own failures. When an enigmatic psychologist enters her life with claims he can help David and a chance meeting with her neighbor Ethel (herself the parent of a difficult child) sparks a genuine friendship, Millie feels she’s been thrown a lifeline. Initially both of these relationships are a boon to Millie, but when the FBI turns it attention to her husband and her neighbors, she soon finds herself unsure whom she can trust and forced to question her own loyalties.

It’s a tricky business blending fact with fiction, but Cantor—who imagined the life of Anne Frank’s sister in her previous novel, Margot—manages to do so beautifully in The Hours Count. Although Millie is Cantor’s creation, she is brought brilliantly to life and her emotional struggles as a young mother in a loveless marriage provide an interesting lens through which to view the historical events of the novel. Millie doesn’t know who the villains are and we must watch as she lets her heart guide her. This ambiguity and uncertainty feels true to life and results in a story that is filled with plenty of surprises, where the stakes feel impossibly high and stolen moments mean the most. A domestic spin on a spy thriller, The Hours Count is an affecting and effective piece of historical fiction that begins with readers asking “What if?” and ends with them wondering “What might have been?” 

In The Hours Count, Jillian Cantor revisits a pivotal moment in American history and asks: What if Ethel and Julius Rosenberg—the only Americans to ever be executed for spying during the Cold War—were actually innocent?
FictionDebut Fiction

California dreaming, deferred

Review by Stephenie Harrison

In 2012, Claire Vaye Watkins burst onto the literary landscape with her prize-winning short story collection, Battleborn. In Gold Fame Citrus, Watkins follows through on her literary promise with an excellent novel, set in a drought-ridden California in a future that feels alarmingly near.

Gold Fame Citrus is the story of Luz, a woman born when California was merely on the cusp of collapse but who must make her way in a world where the waters have run dry and the borders into more verdant parts of the country are blocked off to people of her provenance, so-called “Mojavs.” Along with a drifter named Ray, Luz has managed to carve out an existence in the arid remnants of a place that once glittered, and the two have learned to get by however they can. When they become guardians to an enigmatic slip of a child, however, Luz’s desiccated dreams of what life once was and, perhaps, could some day be again, gush forth. For the sake of their family, they decide to brave the ever-encroaching dune sea, a desolate shifting stretch of sand that separates them from a more habitable climate. But the wasteland they have been led to believe is barren is far from empty and contains untold hazards—some physical, some spiritual, some psychological.

There is no shortage of dystopian literature examining the destruction to the planet that man has wrought and humankind’s tenacious will to survive, but Gold Fame Citrus easily catapults itself into the upper echelon of the genre. Deeply evocative and emotional, Watkins’ writing is hypnotic, drawing readers into a fevered lullaby that feels fantastical and all-too-real simultaneously. This is the kind of novel that readers will want to consume in great gulps as they race to discover Luz and company’s fate, but Gold Fame Citrus is best read slowly, allowing the words to wash over you.

 

This article was originally published in the October 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

In 2012, Claire Vaye Watkins burst onto the literary landscape with her prize-winning short story collection, Battleborn. In Gold Fame Citrus, Watkins follows through on her literary promise with an excellent novel, set in a drought-ridden California in a future that feels alarmingly near.
FictionDystopian Fiction

The dark side of life in the compound

Review by Stephenie Harrison

Imagine a world in which the economy has tanked, jobs have dried up, society has crumbled, and people are doing anything and everything they can just to scrape by. For most of us, such a cataclysmic state of affairs is all too easy to envision, which makes Margaret Atwood’s latest dystopian thriller, The Heart Goes Last, all the more unsettling and eerily prophetic. 

Stan and Charmaine are overworked and overextended. Ever since losing their jobs and their house, they have been living out of their car, squeaking by on tips from Charmaine’s lousy bartending job and doing their best to steer clear of the roving bands of vandals that now roam America. They can’t remember the last time they had a good night’s sleep or a proper shower, so when they see the commercial for a compound named Consilience that promises stable jobs and secure homes, they decide that this is their golden parachute. Sure, they have to be monitored 24/7, and every other month they swap their home for a stint in prison, but it’s better than the alternative. Or, at least it is for a little while, until the dark side of paradise begins to rear its ugly head, and the two find themselves grappling with the reality—and the dangers—of signing their lives away and all the unexpected things they’ve sacrificed in the process.

A reworking of a series of short stories originally published by Byliner, The Heart Goes Last is Atwood’s first standalone novel since 2000 and, in many ways, feels like quintessential Atwood. It examines many of the key issues that she has played with throughout her impressive career—the tug-of-war of power and control between citizens and the state, personal autonomy, and corporate and governmental corruption—with the take-no-prisoners ruthlessness that has become her signature. The Heart Goes Last is a heady blend of speculative fiction with noir undertones that is provocative, powerful and will prompt all readers to reassess which parts of their humanity are for sale.

 

This article was originally published in the October 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Imagine a world in which the economy has tanked, jobs have dried up, society has crumbled, and people are doing anything and everything they can just to scrape by. For most of us, such a cataclysmic state of affairs is all too easy to envision, which makes Margaret Atwood’s latest dystopian thriller, The Heart Goes Last, all the more unsettling and eerily prophetic.
FictionPopular FictionDebut Fiction

When a door closes . . .

Review by Stephenie Harrison

The most common advice to aspiring authors is “Write what you know.” Clearly Elisabeth Egan took this advice to heart when penning her debut novel, A Window Opens, a literary anthem for 21st-century working mothers.

Like Egan herself, her protagonist, Alice Pearse, is a mother of three who has a bookworm’s dream job: writing book reviews for a major women’s magazine. Alice finds her part-time work rewarding, but she especially loves the supportive environment and the fact that she still has the freedom to take an active role in her kids’ lives, nurture her marriage and look after herself. 

All of this changes when Alice’s husband drops a bombshell: He didn’t make partner and plans to open his own law firm. In the meantime, Alice offers to step up as the family breadwinner. When she lands a job at an edgy new start-up that is poised to revolutionize the publishing industry, Alice feels like she’s hit the jackpot. However, as the demands of her professional life intensify, her personal life begins to suffer, and difficult choices must be made.

In the vein of the chick-lit classic I Don’t Know How She Does It, Egan has written a heartfelt, humorous take on the pressures faced by moms and working women, tackling her subject matter with a charming candor that makes readers feel like they are listening to the confidences of a friend. A playful and provocative meditation on what it means to “have it all,” A Window Opens is more than just a mommy manifesto—it’s also an intimate and entertaining yarn that will speak to women from all walks of life.

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read a Q&A with Elisabeth Egan about A Window Opens.

This article was originally published in the September 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

The most common advice to aspiring authors is “Write what you know.” Clearly Elisabeth Egan took this advice to heart when penning her debut novel, A Window Opens, a literary anthem for 21st-century working mothers.
FictionDebut Fiction

A coming-of-age story for the new millennium

Review by Stephenie Harrison

Growing up may be hard to do under the best of circumstances, but for two best friends at the dawn of the millennium, it's outright agony.

The would-be heroes of The War of the Encyclopaedists, Mickey Montauk and Halifax Corderoy, are best buddies bonded by a shared summer in Europe and their penchant for throwing deeply ironic high-concept parties. During the summer of 2004, the two are preparing to head off to Boston for grad school, but on the eve of their farewell blowout bash, Mickey receives news that he will be commanding a squad deploying to Iraq instead. That night triggers a series of events where the decisions each young man makes will ricochet through the following year, some with incendiary consequences, and each threatening to tear their friendship apart the way geography never could. In the months that follow, as Mickey and Corderoy struggle to bear the weight of the mantle of true responsibility that neither one truly wishes for (nor feels entirely equipped to carry), they keep in touch by editing a series of escalating Wikipedia entries based on themselves that, like Mickey and Corderoy, begin as something glib and flippant and mature into something more.

 

Written by two real-life friends, Christopher Robinson and Gavin Kovite, The War of the Encyclopaedists, is an explosive debut. It’s edgy and erudite, not to mention remarkably self-assured for a first novel. It perfectly captures the aimlessness as well as the bluster and bravado of youth, and though it does not ever pull its punches—particularly when discussing the brutality of war—it is sharply sentimental too. The War of the Encyclopaedists works not only as an excellent piece of fiction about war in the 21st century, but also as an incredibly timely and compassionate coming-of-age story for the new millennium; Robinson and Kovite have authoritatively homed in on the specific anxieties and alienation that afflict the latest generation of twenty-somethings attempting to find their place in the world. Daring and ambitious, The War of the Enyclopaedists is an essential piece of fiction for readers of all ages. 

Growing up may be hard to do under the best of circumstances, but for two best friends at the dawn of the millennium, it's outright agony.
FictionDebut Fiction

Twinned fates

Review by Stephenie Harrison

What do two twin sisters who star in a Coney Island sideshow, a woman whose mother-in-law may have had her committed to an insane asylum, and a sanitation worker who finds an orphaned baby girl while completing his rounds one night have in common? The question sounds like the set up to a rather ghoulish joke, and yet untangling this mystery forms the basis of Leslie Parry’s dazzling debut, Church of Marvels.

Set in 1895, Church of Marvels takes readers deep into the shadowy underworld of turn-of-the-century New York City and its fringes. It is a story of hardscrabble lives intersecting in the most shocking ways—a story that is sometimes quite ugly but often made beautiful by its colorful cast of characters. This is not a novel with a single heart to it, but rather a chorus of four, and they are engaged in a scavenger hunt where their very salvation is at stake. To say any more would do a disservice to the devilish twists and legitimately shocking surprises that Parry has plotted for her readers. This is a book best entered in the dark, so when its revelations unfold, they are all the more dazzling.

Despite its historical setting, Parry’s world-building and character crafting are so strong that Church of Marvels feels fresh and timely, a thoughtful and satisfying modern work dressed up with all the bells and whistles of an old-fashioned Victorian romp. At times it reads like a Sarah Waters novel—with the compassion and cunning that implies—set in America. Utterly electrifying, this is the kind of novel readers will race through, only to turn the final page feeling ever so slightly heartbroken that the story has reached its end. Let’s hope that Parry has plenty more tricks up her sleeve.

 

This article was originally published in the May 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

RELATED CONTENT: Read a Q&A with Parry about Church of Marvels.

What do two twin sisters who star in a Coney Island sideshow, a woman whose mother-in-law may have had her committed to an insane asylum, and a sanitation worker who finds an orphaned baby girl while completing his rounds one night have in common? The question sounds like the set up to a rather ghoulish joke, and yet untangling this mystery forms the basis of Leslie Parry’s dazzling debut, Church of Marvels.
FictionPopular Fiction

So you want to be a princess?

Review by Stephenie Harrison

When she married Prince William back in 2011, Kate Middleton didn’t just capture the heart of a future king—she also ensnared the imaginations of women worldwide. Will and Kate’s royal romance has been meticulously documented by the press and even been the subject of a Lifetime movie. Now it serves as the inspiration for the first adult novel by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan, the duo behind the snarky celebrity-fashion blog, Go Fug Yourself, and authors of two young adult novels (Messy and Spoiled).

In The Royal We, Cocks and Morgan blend fact and fiction to put their own spin on the “unlikely princess” motif: Rebecca Porter isn’t just a brash, carefree commoner, she’s an American to boot! But when a semester abroad at Oxford lands her down the hall from Prince Nicholas, heir to the British throne, an unlikely friendship develops and the sparks soon fly.

It’s a tricky business basing a novel on a pairing whose romantic ups and downs are already so well known, but Cocks and Morgan have managed to do so with charm and wit. Bex and Nick’s relationship does sometimes too closely mirror that of their real-world counterparts; however there are enough creative twists thrown in to keep things fresh. In particular, the pragmatism is unexpected—The Royal We pulls back the veil on the fantasy of what it really means for a regular person to be part of the royal family, and it doesn’t skim over the sacrifice required to reach a happy ending. Readers should prepare to lose their hearts to The Royal We, a loving satire that is scandalously funny and wonderfully romantic.

 

This article was originally published in the April 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

When she married Prince William back in 2011, Kate Middleton didn’t just capture the heart of a future king—she also ensnared the imaginations of women worldwide. Will and Kate’s royal romance has been meticulously documented by the press and even been the subject of a Lifetime movie. Now it serves as the inspiration for the first adult novel by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan, the duo behind the snarky celebrity-fashion blog, Go Fug Yourself, and authors of two young adult novels (Messy and Spoiled).
FictionLiterary Fiction

An exquisitely heartbreaking second novel

Review by Stephenie Harrison

The first thing that is immediately apparent about Hanya Yanagihara’s second novel, A Little Life, is that it has been incorrectly named: There is nothing little about this novel—not the lives depicted within it or the size of its author’s ambitions and talents. And not the page count, either. It is a hulking doorstop of a book, perfect for the reader who likes to burrow into a book for weeks at a time.

If such an expansive novel must be reduced to an overly simplified summary, A Little Life charts the lives and friendships of a group of four men—JB, Malcolm, Willem and Jude—who meet their freshman year of college and then orbit one another for decades thereafter. It is a novel that delves deep into all the moments that make up a life, from the quiet to the loud, the glorious and the shameful, exploring the things that make a person who he is while simultaneously breaking him as well. Monumentally epic in its detail and scope, it is a book about friendship, courage, redemption, aging, desperation, family, love.

Written in luminous prose that is becoming Yanagihara’s hallmark, A Little Life is a gorgeous book that is, at times, shockingly horrific in its subject matter. In Yanagihara’s provocative debut, The People in the Trees, she took readers on a scandalously dark and painful journey, but her first novel seems rather tame when compared to the torments explored here. There are moments of lightness and beauty, yes, but do not go into this book expecting it to do anything other than break your heart—albeit in the most exquisite fashion. This book is not for every reader, but if you can withstand the maelstrom that is A Little Life, you will be rewarded with a thrillingly good read.   

 

RELATED CONTENT: Read our interview with Hanya Yanagihara about A Little Life.

The first thing that is immediately apparent about Hanya Yanagihara’s second novel, A Little Life, is that it has been incorrectly named: There is nothing little about this novel—not the lives depicted within it or the size of its author’s ambitions and talents. And not the page count, either. It is a hulking doorstop of a book, perfect for the reader who likes to burrow into a book for weeks at a time.

FictionDebut Fiction

A dark thrill-ride in the bayou

Review by Stephenie Harrison

New Orleans-based writer Tom Cooper’s The Marauders is a debut novel that does nothing in half measures. It isn’t afraid to take risks, dabble in darkness and skirt the edge of ruin, and this is what makes it such an exciting read.

Set in a bayou shrimping community still dealing with the fallout from Hurricane Katrina, The Marauders takes readers on a rollicking adventure deep into the heart of Louisiana’s marshes as well as some of the darkest corners of the human psyche. Featuring a colorful cast of characters—from identical twin marijuana moguls to a one-armed treasure hunter to a slick oil company rep trying to swindle his own mother—it tells the stories of folk on the fringes, many of whom can only find common ground in their shared desire to carve out a living (some noble, some less so) in their tiny corner of the world. Alas, as competing interests cause their lives to collide, only a few will succeed and not all will survive.

Brash and unapologetic, The Marauders is a thrill ride. The plot is brisk, the characters are captivating and the writing is lush and striking. Cooper’s writing is the kind a reader can happily get lost in, and his depictions of the Deep South are so evocative that if he ever gets tired of fiction, he might give travel writing a try. But The Marauders is such an impressive offering from an audacious new voice in fiction that one can only hope it is but the first of many. As far as bibliophilic treasure hunts go, this one is literary gold.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

New Orleans-based writer Tom Cooper’s The Marauders is a debut novel that does nothing in half measures. It isn’t afraid to take risks, dabble in darkness and skirt the edge of ruin, and this is what makes it such an exciting read.
FictionDebut Fiction

A dark Bulgarian fairytale

Review by Stephenie Harrison

Greek mythology and Bulgarian fairy tales have never felt as modern as they do in Wildalone, Krassi Zourkova’s debut novel. Building on the momentum established by Stephenie Meyer’s ever-popular Twilight franchise, the Bulgarian-born Zourkova introduces fans of supernatural romance to a dark and heady new love triangle involving a gifted musician and two bewitching brothers.

Forsaking her family and her homeland, Thea Slavin leaves Bulgaria to attend Princeton University in the hope of becoming a world-class pianist . . . and of uncovering the truth behind the mysterious death of her older sister several years earlier. Struggling to assimilate into American culture and meet the demands of Ivy League life, Thea finds herself drawn into a sensual relationship with two brothers, Rhys and Jake Estin, each of whom seems to have secrets of his own—and the answers may lie in the myths and legends Thea grew up with and had dismissed as nothing more than stories. As shocking truths are revealed and fantasies made real, Thea must decide how far she will go for love.

Moody and mesmerizing, Wildalone is sure to appeal to lovers of the alpha-male romance. Despite working as a lawyer, Zourkova writes prose that is lush and seductive, whether she’s describing the Princeton campus or her own Bulgarian homeland—not to mention the electric relationship between Thea and her two suitors. An imaginative and ambitious first novel, Wildalone is a dark, sensual fairytale that will leave readers begging for a sequel.

 

This article was originally published in the January 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

RELATED CONTENT: Read a Q&A with Krassi Zourkova about Wildalone.

Greek mythology and Bulgarian fairy tales have never felt as modern as they do in Wildalone, Krassi Zourkova’s debut novel. Building on the momentum established by Stephenie Meyer’s ever-popular Twilight franchise, the Bulgarian-born Zourkova introduces fans of supernatural romance to a dark and heady new love triangle involving a gifted musician and two bewitching brothers.
FictionPopular Fiction

A mystery surrounding Jane Austen’s masterpiece

Review by Stephenie Harrison

If the mark of a great author is not merely how much she incites the imaginations of readers but the extent to which she inspires fellow writers, then there can be no doubt that Jane Austen is the greatest author of them all. Just when you think the market for Austen spinoffs has reached capacity, a new book comes onto the scene that turns the genre on its head. Such is the case with First Impressions, Charlie Lovett’s delightful new novel.

Sophie Collingwood has always loved books and also fancies herself something of a detective, so when the opportunity to work at one of London’s antiquarian bookstores presents itself, it seems a dream come true. But when two different men request her assistance in tracking down an obscure religious text, Sophie is drawn into a hunt that calls into question the authorship of the most famous work of English literature: Pride & Prejudice. As the mystery around this potentially earth-shattering tome thickens and the literary treasure hunt turns deadly, Sophie finds herself worrying that her own life may be on the line along with Austen’s reputation.

Part mystery, part love story, First Impressions is a 100 percent thumping good read and a loving homage to one of literature’s most beloved authors. Lovett takes readers on a rollicking adventure that cleverly weaves in the best elements of Austen’s novels, while also giving life to Austen’s own personal history in a satisfying and captivating way. It’s a giddy novel that celebrates books and the people who love them as much as it entertains, making it the perfect read for bookworms and Janeites alike.

RELATED CONTENT: Read a Q&A with Lovett about First Impressions.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2014 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

If the mark of a great author is not merely how much she incites the imaginations of readers but the extent to which she inspires fellow writers, then there can be no doubt that Jane Austen is the greatest author of them all. Just when you think the market for Austen spinoffs has reached capacity, a new book comes onto the scene that turns the genre on its head. Such is the case with First Impressions, Charlie Lovett’s delightful new novel.

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