My Absolute Darling: A Novel
A novel about Turtle, a girl living in isolation in northern California, trying to reclaim her life from her controlling father’s violence. Natural description and survival tension are bound to psychological pain.
Work Information
In a harsh natural world, a girl struggles to recover her own voice.
First edition confirmed from Riverhead Books. A French translation was also published and received award attention.
Review Summaries
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Readers respond strongly to the natural description and the heroine’s characterization, while some find the violence difficult. It is often described as an intense reading experience.
Book Information
- Publisher
- Riverhead Books
- Published
- 2017-08-29
- Pages
- 432 pages
- Language
- 英語
- Size
- 16.03 x 3.51 x 23.65 cm
- ISBN-13
- 9780735211179
- ISBN-10
- 0735211175
- Price
- 2799 JPY
- Category
- 洋書/Literature & Fiction/Genre Fiction/Action & Adventure
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER LA TIMES BOOK PRIZE FINALIST NBCC JOHN LEONARD PRIZE FINALIST ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES'S MOST NOTABLE BOOKS OF 2017 ONE OF THE WASHINGTON POST’S MOST NOTABLE BOOKS OF 2017 ONE OF NPR’S ‘GREAT READS’ OF 2017 A USA TODAY BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR AN AMAZON.COM BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR A BUSINESS INSIDER BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR "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 A brilliant and 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 raised on the Mendocino coast by two mothers. He received his B.A. from Willamette University in 2010, and after graduation spent two seasons leading youth trail crews in the backcountry of the Pacific Northwest. Tallent lives in Salt Lake City.
Reviews
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Gut-wrenching and brilliant novel
A brilliant and horrific account of the psychological impact of abuse. To describe the book as a 'thriller' implies that it will provide superficial entertainment - and this novel does anything but that. The accounts of abuse are graphic and uncompromising, and must have taken a toll on the author to write. Tallent's prose is luscious and detailed - it soaks the reader in the main character's surroundings, and also enters the reader into her often devastating stream of consciousness as she uses all her strength to survive her father's insanity and abuse. An excellent representation of Stockholm Syndrome between an abusive parent and a child, which takes every ounce of the main character's will and energy to escape, often relapsing along the way. Recommended read, but might be triggering for people who themselves have suffered childhood abuse. Read with caution.
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Iain Banks on acid
Excellent book. Reminiscent of The Wasp Factory, but a bit closer to Stephen King. Better observed than most books I've read recently, very original and well written. Not a whodunnit or tract of social observation, so no surplus characters or tiresome plot twists. A real page-turner and very satisfying to read.
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Read it for courage and maupulative lives
Great description .very elaborate scene and character description. I almost felt i am livibg wuth them.
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An amazing but gut-wrenching read
I don‘t want to say too much, so I‘ll just say - the poetry of the language evokes images in your head that are amazingly vivid and stir emotions within you that you didn’t know you had. But be warned, the plot is dark, and tempestuous, it swallows you whole and spits you out. You‘ll never unsee what you‘ll see through this thickly woven plot with its change in pace and emotional highs and lows.
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This is a wonderful book
This is a wonderful book: poetic, full of interesting insights, observations, meditations, glorious evocation of place. The characterisation of Turtle is compelling, the story keeps you turning the page. For me this was a gasp out loud wonderful book. I haven't responded to a book in such a way since I read Station Eleven. Gabriel Tallent imagines the life of a bright, abused young teenager with great empathy. It is well known that abused children often love and even protect their abusive parent. It can be hard to fathom that love but GT explores this awful sick and self-annihilating love with sensitivity, generosity and wisdom. It must have been hard to end such an intense powerful story. The ending, though you'd want it no other way, is perhaps the weakest part of the story perhaps because it is an end to the book's intensity but heck, why not end on a hopeful note (I don't think I've given too much away). I loved the way GT names unusual natural phenomenon. The amazon kindle built in dictionary was invaluable for this. I am grateful to GT for making me look up words in the amazon dictionary.