Starred review from October 15, 2024
An overworked immigration lawyer and his religious mother work to finally face their pasts. Haslett's third novel is partly narrated by Peter Fischer, a New York City lawyer working for a nonprofit handling asylum cases. There, and in the rest of his life, he handles things with assurance but little joy--his lover, Cliff, has little more depth than a dating-app hookup, and he avoids conversations with his snarky and unfiltered sister, Liz. But he's unsettled when he takes on the case of Vasel Marku, a young gay Albanian man seeking asylum over fears he'll face homophobic persecution. Peter's narration of his unusually deep involvement in Vasel's case is braided around third-person narration about his mother, Ann, who leads a women-focused spiritual retreat in Vermont with her partner, Clare. Ann's breakup with her husband (and Peter's father) after falling for Clare disrupted her life, and it's clear that both mother and son have been swallowing a lot of unspoken hurt. The strength of Haslett's storytelling is its deliberation, slowly peeling back the veneers of Peter's and Ann's professional accomplishments and cool public personas to reveal storms of guilt and fear. The two share complex queer sexual coming-of-age stories--Peter as a teenager falling for a handsome and emotionally distant classmate, Ann as a middle-aged woman falling for a woman, shipwrecking her marriage and career as a pastor. They share losses, too--Peter's father's death from cancer and a withheld event that gives the novel its emotional payoff. It's "practically mandatory," Clare observes, for women to "hide in other people's pain," just as men like Peter are asked to never feel it. And though the outlines of the novel suggest sentimental family-trauma fare, Haslett's sophisticated grasp of the ways that people over-police their feelings makes it a remarkably acute and effective character study. A family-in-crisis story that keenly captures deep-seated fears and regrets.
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Starred review from November 1, 2024
Haslett (Imagine Me Gone, 2016) introduces the Fischer family in this superb, character-driven novel. Protagonist Peter, 40 and gay, works as an immigration lawyer. His older sister, Liz, a more secondary character, produces cosplay events. And their mother, Ann, a former Episcopal priest, cofounded a women's retreat in northern Vermont with her life partner, Clare. Moving backward in time, the novel takes us to Peter's teenage years, when he is desperately in love with beautiful, charismatic Jared, who's straight--or appears to be. Flash forward to the present, as Peter gets a new client, a 21-year-old Albanian named Vasel, who, if deported to Albania, may be killed for being gay. Peter quickly becomes obsessed with the case and the enigmatic Vasel. Meanwhile, the action moves to the retreat, where it limns Ann's quiet, quotidian life and closely examines her longtime relationship with Clare as well as her relationship with Peter, uneasy for reasons that are gradually revealed. This deeply satisfying novel is a revelation--a thoughtful, psychologically acute, beautifully written examination of intersecting lives. The characters come alive on the page, commanding readers' attention. This novel is sure to receive accolades, and it richly deserves them.
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Starred review from September 2, 2024
Haslett’s irresistable latest (after Imagine Me Gone) revolves around the mystery of a man’s teenage trauma. Peter, a 40-year-old immigration lawyer, works on asylum seekers’ cases in New York City. In interlocking threads, Haslett delves into Peter’s work on the case of a gay Albanian immigrant and his upbringing with his mother Ann, an Episcopal priest. In the latter timeline, Peter gradually discovers his own sexuality with his stunning and mysterious friend Jared. A third story line follows Ann as she divorces Peter’s father for a woman named Clare, with whom she goes on to found a women’s retreat, Viriditas. Ann and Clare’s relationship struggles as Ann develops feelings for another woman at the retreat. Gradually, the reason for the rift between Peter and Ann—a harrowing event that happened over the course of one fateful evening during his youth—is revealed, leading to a climactic present-day confrontation between mother and son at Viriditas. Themes of guilt, new beginnings, survival, and violence permeate the excellent and subtle story of characters grappling with events beyond their control, and the author, himself an immigration lawyer, delivers a deeply personal portrait of Peter’s tenacious advocacy for his clients. This matches the heights of Haslett’s best work. Agent: Amanda Urban, CAA.
December 1, 2024
Peter Fischer is an immigration lawyer whose days are spent in client interviews, court appearances, and deportation hearings. His workaholic life leaves little room for romance, other than occasional hookups with forgettable men. Meanwhile, his mother, Ann, has decamped with her partner Clare to rural Vermont, where they run a retreat for women seeking healing or self-awareness. Peter and Ann lead parallel lives, but their long estrangement ends when Peter's ordered existence is upset by a new client, a young Albanian seeking refuge in the United States after being tortured and humiliated for being gay. For Peter, this asylum case awakens painful memories of his first crush on a handsome high school friend. His subsequent response forces mother and son to finally confront the past. VERDICT There is no shortage of pathos in the heartbreaking stories of Peter's clients or the accounts of abuse experienced by Ann's retreat guests. But Haslett's (Imagine Me Gone) melancholy novel finds some resolution and ends on an uplifting note for its asylum seekers, troubled women, mother, and son.--Barbara Love
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