My Absolute Darling by Gabriel Tallent

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My Absolute Darling by Gabriel Tallent

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My Absolute Darling by Gabriel Tallent

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
FINALIST FOR THE LA TIMES BOOK PRIZE AND THE JOHN LEONARD PRIZE
NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE NEW YORK TIMES, WASHINGTON POST, NPR, AND USA TODAY

"Impossible to put down." --NPR

"A novel that readers will gulp down, gasping." --The Washington Post

"The word 'masterpiece' has been cheapened by too many blurbs, but My Absolute Darling absolutely is one." --Stephen King

From the author of the forthcoming Crux, a brilliant, immersive, all-consuming read about one fourteen-year-old girl's heart-stopping fight for her own soul.


Turtle Alveston is a survivor. At fourteen, she roams the woods along the northern California coast. The creeks, tide pools, and rocky islands are her haunts and her hiding grounds, and she is known to wander for miles. But while her physical world is expansive, her personal one is small and treacherous: Turtle has grown up isolated since the death of her mother, in the thrall of her tortured and charismatic father, Martin. Her social existence is confined to the middle school (where she fends off the interest of anyone, student or teacher, who might penetrate her shell) and to her life with her father.

Then Turtle meets Jacob, a high-school boy who tells jokes, lives in a big clean house, and looks at Turtle as if she is the sunrise. And for the first time, the larger world begins to come into focus: her life with Martin is neither safe nor sustainable. Motivated by her first experience with real friendship and a teenage crush, Turtle starts to imagine escape, using the very survival skills her father devoted himself to teaching her. What follows is a harrowing story of bravery and redemption. With Turtle's escalating acts of physical and emotional courage, the reader watches, heart in throat, as this teenage girl struggles to become her own hero--and in the process, becomes ours as well.

Shot through with striking language in a fierce natural setting, My Absolute Darling is an urgently told, profoundly moving read that marks the debut of an extraordinary new writer.

Gabriel Tallent was born in New Mexico and reared by two moms on the Mendocino coast. He graduated with a B.A. After graduating from Willamette University in 2010, he spent two seasons directing youth trail crews in the Pacific Northwest's wilderness. Tallent is a resident of Salt Lake City.

SKU Unavailable
ISBN 13 9780735211186
ISBN 10 0735211183
Title My Absolute Darling
Author Gabriel Tallent
Condition Unavailable
Binding Type Paperback
Publisher Penguin Putnam Inc
Year published 2018-06-26
Number of pages 432
Cover note Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.