Women and Children First by Alina Grabowski
“How often do you finish a novel, only to find yourself flipping back to the first page and thinking, I really ought to start that all over again? . . . Set in a struggling New England town, the novel unfolds through interlocking stories—something like Elizabeth Strout’s Olive Kitteridge or Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Goon Squad . . . a rich and textured book, with shades not only of those female authors, but also Mary Gaitskill or Lorrie Moore, through its investigation into female agency, power, and vulnerability.” —Vogue.com
A Most Anticipated Book of 2024 by Debutiful, Oprah Daily, and Vogue • A Most Anticipated Book of Spring 2024 by the New York Times
A gripping literary puzzle that unwinds the private lives of ten women as they confront tragedy in a small Massachusetts town.
- Sale Date
- ISBN
- 9781638932772
- Page Count
- 336
- Language
- English
- Dimensions
- 5⅝ x 8¼
- Imprint
- SJP Lit
Meet the Author
Alina GrabowskiA Most Anticipated Book of 2024 by Debutiful, Oprah Daily, and Vogue • A Most Anticipated Book of Spring 2024 by the New York Times
A gripping literary puzzle that unwinds the private lives of ten women as they confront tragedy in a small Massachusetts town.
Nashquitten, MA, is a decaying coastal enclave that not even tourist season can revive, full of locals who have run the town’s industries for generations. When a young woman dies at a house party, the circumstances around her death suspiciously unclear, the tight-knit community is shaken. As a mother grieves her daughter, a teacher her student, a best friend her confidante, the events around the tragedy become a lightning rod: blame is cast, secrets are buried deeper. Some are left to pick up the pieces, while others turn their backs, and all the while, a truth about that dreadful night begins to emerge.
Told through the eyes of ten local women, Grabowski’s Women and Children First is an exquisite portrait of grief and a powerful reminder of life’s interconnectedness. Touching on womanhood, class, and sexuality, ambition, disappointment, and tragedy, this novel is a stunning rendering of love and loss, and a bracing lesson from a phenomenal new literary talent that no one walks this earth alone.
Praise for Women and Children First
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“Magnetic . . . The ennui of small-town life is perfectly captured in the slice-of-life vignettes, which coalesce into a riveting set of Rashomon-style retellings. Grabowski shows immense promise.”
Publishers Weekly, starred review -
“I am a big fan of Women and Children First . . . Alina Grabowski is an astute and limber narrative artist and I could read her prose all day long and never grow weary.”
Lorrie Moore, author of A Gate at the Stairs -
“In Grabowski’s craftily constructed and deeply moving debut, ten girls and women in a decaying coastal Massachusetts tourist town respond to the death of a teenager at a house party . . . Grabowski so deftly depicts the web of relations in this oppressively tight-knit community that it becomes evident how life changes for one character reverberate even for those who would seem outside her sphere of influence.”
Booklist, starred review
About the Imprint
Gorgeous, big-hearted, and thought-provoking stories—acquired and championed by Sarah Jessica Parker herself. All curated with the passion of a lifelong reader turned publisher.
