First published 2017
Linda lives with her parents in a crumbling commune deep in the Minnesota woods. At fourteen, she feels like an outsider everywhere. At school, she watches the popular Lily from afar. She develops feelings for Mr. Grierson, her history teacher, until police arrest him for child pornography. The scandal forces Linda to examine her own confused desires and desperate need to belong somewhere. When the Gardner family arrives at the house across the lake, they offer Linda a babysitting job watching their young son Paul. For the first time, Linda feels wanted and useful. She throws herself into caring for the boy and helping his mother. But the Gardners harbor beliefs and secrets that Linda cannot grasp. Over several crucial days, Linda makes decisions that will shape the rest of her life. She must choose between the isolated world she knows and a larger world full of moral complexities she struggles to understand.
Genres: literary-fiction, coming-of-age, contemporary, family-drama
Vibes: atmospheric, emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: fish-out-of-water, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Minnesota, United States
Period: 20th-century
288 pages · Kindle Edition · Atlantic Monthly Press
Content warnings: child-abuse, mental-illness