Archives par étiquette : Writers House

GOODBYE EARL de Leesa Cross-Smith

Four women take fate into their own hands in this big-hearted story of friendship, resilience, and revenge on monstrous men, from the award-winning author of Half-Blown Rose.

GOODBYE EARL
by Leesa Cross-Smith
Grand Central, July 2023
(via Writers House)

Taking inspiration from The Chicks’ infamous, empowering song, GOODBYE EARL follows four best friends through two unforgettable summers, fifteen years apart.
In 2004, Rosemarie, Ada, Caroline, and Kasey are in their final days of high school and on the precipice of all the things teenagers look forward to when anything in life seems possible . . . from falling in love, to finding their dream jobs, to becoming who they were meant to be.
In 2019, Kasey has returned to her small Southern hometown for the first time since high school—and she still hasn’t told even her closest friends the truth of what really happened that summer after graduation, or what made her leave so abruptly without looking back. Now reunited with her friends in Goldie for a wedding, she’s determined to focus on the simple joy of being together again. But when she notices troubling signs that one of them might be in danger, she is catapulted back to that fateful summer. This time, Kasey refuses to let the worst moments of her past define her; this time, she knows how to protect those she loves at all costs.
Uplifting, sharp-edged, and unapologetic, GOODBYE EARL is a funeral for all the “Earls” out there—the abusive men who think they can get away with anything, but are wrong—and a celebration of enduring sisterhood.

Leesa Cross-Smith is a homemaker and the author of Every Kiss a War, Whiskey & Ribbons, So We Can Glow, This Close to Okay, and Half-Blown Rose.

CUTTING TEETH de Chandler Baker

For fans of Big Little Lies and Nothing to See Here, a novel that asks: do we really have to give our children everything?

CUTTING TEETH
by Chandler Baker
Flatiron, July 2023
(via Writers House)

Rhea, Darby, and Mary Beth are on personal quests to reclaim aspects of their identities subsumed by motherhood—their careers, their sex lives, their bodies. But all three women are about to lose major ground when they realize their children, who all attend the same preschool, have developed an unsettling medical condition: the kids are craving blood.
It seems a little strange but relatively benign until a young teacher is found dead. And now, the only potential witnesses (and suspects) are ten adorable four-year-olds. Part murder mystery, part motherhood manifesto, the novel explores the standards society holds mothers to—along with the ones to which we hold ourselves—and the things no one tells you about becoming a parent.

“As brutal in its honesty as it is in its deceptions, CUTTING TEETH is a viciously sinuous whodunnit . . . an incisive and fearless exploration of motherhood and the self-inflicted wounds we hide up our sleeves as we each struggle to survive it.” —Elle Cosimano, USA Today bestselling author of Finlay Donovan Is Killing It

“With devourable writing and pitch-perfect humour, CUTTING TEETH is a sharp, original, wickedly astute look at the sting of modern motherhood. In this group of toddlers and parents out for blood (literally!), Chandler Baker nails the performance pressures of parenthood, and the unachievable standards to which we hold ourselves.” —Ashley Audrain, New York Times bestselling author of The Push

Chandler Baker is the New York Times bestselling author of the Reese Witherspoon book club pick Whisper Network as well as The Husbands, a Good Morning America Book Club Pick, and a number of YA novels. CUTTING TEETH is her third novel for adults.

FRACTAL NOISE de Christopher Paolini

A new blockbuster science-fiction adventure from world-wide phenomenon and #1 New York Times bestseller Christopher Paolini, set in the world of New York Times and USA Today bestseller To Sleep in a Sea of Stars.

FRACTAL NOISE
by Christopher Paolini
Tor, May 2023
(via Writers House)

July 25th, 2234: The crew of the Adamura discovers the Anomaly. On the seemingly uninhabited planet Talos VII: a circular pit, 50 kilometers wide. Its curve not of nature, but design. Now, a small team must land and journey on foot across the surface to learn who built the hole and why. But they all carry the burdens of lives carved out on disparate colonies in the cruel cold of space. For some the mission is the dream of the lifetime, for others a risk not worth taking, and for one it is a desperate attempt to find meaning in an uncaring universe. Each step they take toward the mysterious abyss is more punishing than the last. And the ghosts of their past follow.

Christopher Paolini, firstborn of Kenneth and Talita. Creator of the World of Eragon and the Fractalverse. Holder of the Guinness World Record for youngest author of a bestselling series. Qualified for marksman in the Australian army. Scottish Laird. Dodged gunfire . . . more than once. As a child, was chased by a moose in Alaska. Has his name inscribed on Mars. Husband. Father. Asker of questions and teller of stories.

SPEECH TEAM de Tim Murphy

A lively and warmhearted novel starring four precocious Gen X teen-turne-twenty-first-century middle-agers who are seeking . . . well, if not exactly justice from a long-ago hurtful teacher, then at least some kind of long-desired reckoning and closure. By the acclaimed author of Christodora.

SPEECH TEAM
by Tim Murphy
Viking, Summer 2023
(via Writers House)

Late one morning, parked in a desk chair at his humdrum job, Tip Murray finds himself reading the suicide note of his long-lost high school friend Pete Stroman. Mentioned in the note as a root cause of Pete’s despair? A disparaging comment made to him about his developmental disability by none other than their high school speech team coach, Gary Gold.
As more thorny memories surface from their eighties adolescence, Tip and his best friend, fellow speech team alum Nat Farb-Miola, decide to reconnect with their other teammates, and they discover an unsettling thread: all were quietly wounded by Mr. Gold’s offhandedly insensitive remarks. The silver lining? Gary Gold is still alive, and a quick Google search tells the quartet that he has retired to Florida. There’s only one thing left to do: confront him.
By turns incisive and sweet, alive with the sting of wounds past and the hopeful possibility of the present, SPEECH TEAM explores what it means to take account of the pain that can suffuse a life and what it means, years on, to move forward.

Tim Murphy is the author of the novels Correspondents and Christodora, both published by Grove Atlantic. Christodora was longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal. Under the name Timothy Murphy, he is also the author of the 1990s novels Getting Off Clean and The Breeders Box. He has been for nearly 20 years a journalist focusing mostly on HIV/AIDS and LGBTQ issues, for publications including the New York Times, New York magazine, Out magazine, the Nation, POZ magazine, and for the magazines of the ACLU and Lambda Legal.

BEWARE THE WOMAN de Megan Abbott

From New York Times bestselling and award-winning author Megan Abbott, an eerie and prescient novel about a family outing gone terribly awry.

BEWARE THE WOMAN
by Megan Abbott
‎ Putnam, June 2023
(via Writers House)

Honey, I just want you to have everything you ever wanted. 
That’s what Jacy’s mom always told her. And Jacy felt like she finally did. Newly married and with a baby on the way, Jacy and her new husband Jed embark on their first road trip together to visit his father, Doctor Ash, in Michigan’s far-flung Upper Peninsula. The moment they arrive in the cozy cottage in the lush woods, Jacy feels bathed in love by the warm and hospitable Doctor Ash, if less so by his house manager, the enigmatic Mrs. Brandt.
But their Edenic first days take a turn when Jacy has a health scare. Swiftly, vacation activities are scrapped, and all eyes are on Jacy’s condition. At the same time, whispers about Jed’s long-dead mother and complicated family history seem eerily to be impeding upon the present. As the days pass, Jacy begins to feel trapped in the cottage, her every move surveilled, her body under the looking glass. But are her fears founded or is it paranoia, or cabin fever, or—as is suggested to her—a stubborn refusal to take necessary precautions? The dense woods surrounding the cottage are full of dangers, but are the greater ones inside?

Megan Abbott is the award-winning author of ten novels, including Give Me Your Hand, You Will Know Me, The Fever, Dare Me, and The End of Everything. She received her PhD in literature from New York University. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times Magazine, The Guardian, and The Believer. She’s the co-creator and executive producer of USA’s adaptation of Dare Me and was a staff writer on HBO’s David Simon show The Deuce. Abbott lives in New York City.