The Outside of August by Joanna Hershon

The Outside of August by Joanna Hershon

Critics and readers alike hailed Swimming, Joanna Hershon's fiction debut. Compelling, said the Washington Post, while Vanity Fair called Swimming a page-turning premiere. Now Hershon brings us her anticipated second novel, in which she vividly explores the secrets of an American family. The Outside of August is a mesmerizing, beautifully written story that combs the emotional landscape of its characters with power and precision.

For as long as Alice Green can remember, her elusive mother, Charlotte, has moved in and out of family life--disappearing relentlessly and often without explanation. Despite the exotic clutter of souvenirs that detail Charlotte's international travels, the Green's home becomes progressively hollow, as nothing but Charlotte can fill the empty spaces.

With their mother's tenuous presence, and their tender but distant father working long hours, Alice and her brother, August, react in different ways. While seeking constant affection from other women, August relies on an unspoken bond with Charlotte that allows him a certain freedom. But Alice feels no such security and grows increasingly unmoored, always in search of ways to keep her mother at home.

When, years later, her unfettered brother becomes strangely remote, Alice journeys to find him in an isolated beach town. It is there that a deeply buried secret will have to unravel in order for Alice to come to terms with her fractured family and her place within it--and learn to let go of a mother she perhaps never really knew.

From the Hardcover edition.

Hershon, Joanna: -

Joanna Hershon is the author of Swimming, The Outside of August, The German Bride and A Dual Inheritance. Her writing has appeared in Granta, The New York Times, The Yale Review, One Story, The Virginia Quarterly Review, and two literary anthologies: Brooklyn Was Mine and Freud's Blind Spot.

She is an adjunct assistant professor in the Creative Writing department at Columbia University and lives in Brooklyn with her husband, painter Derek Buckner, their twin sons and daughter.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780345441836
ISBN 10	0345441834
Title	The Outside of August
Author	Joanna Hershon
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Random House USA Inc
Year published	2004-04-27
Number of pages	336
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.