Carthage

After her lavishly imagined, supernatural historical novel, The Accursed (2013), Oates turns in the latest of her intensely magnified studies of a family in crisis and the agony of a misfit girl. Zeno Mayfield, a former mayor of the small Adirondack town of Carthage, and his wife, Arlette, have two daughters. Juliet is as good as she is beautiful. Cressida is difficult. Smart, spiky, gnomish, and artistic, inky-frizzy haired Cressida may be autistic. Sweet Juliet gets engaged to handsome, civic-minded Brett Kincaid, who promptly enlists after 9/11. He returns severely injured, horribly scarred, and deeply traumatized. Then Cressida disappears, and grief decimates her loving family. Flashbacks to Brett's hellish experiences in Iraq carry a powerful indictment of war crimes, while a harrowing visit to a maximum-security prison by an enigmatic investigative writer exposes the horrors of incarceration and capital punishment. Oates' eerie, plangent, and gripping tale of a missing 19-year-old outcast and a betrayed warrior pivots on her interpretations of Cressida's medieval namesake, who abandoned one soldier for another, and Zeno's paradox concerning infinity within the finite as a state of perpetual yearning. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Oates will stay in the spotlight as The Accursed comes out in paperback, and Carthage is vigorously promoted in all media formats.--Seaman, Donna Copyright 2010 Booklist

Oates (The Accursed) returns with another novel that ratchets up the unsettling to her signature feverish pitch. Beginning with an attention-grabbing opener that begets addictive reading-Zeno Mayfield and a search party are on the hunt for Mayfield's missing 19-year-old daughter, Cressida, in the Adirondack woods-the story chronicles the creepy circumstances surrounding the girl's assumed murder. Was she, as many in the upstate New York town of Carthage suspect, beaten to death and dumped in the Black River by her older sister's ex-fiance, Brett Kincaid, a decorated Iraqi War vet? Or did she, the "dark twisty" daughter prone to excessive self-loathing, play some perverse role in her own disappearance? What transports the story beyond a carefully crafted whodunit is Oates's dogged exploration of each character's culpability in the case, which spans nearly seven years. Between Kincaid's noncoerced but PTSD-fueled confession and Cressida's feelings that her family didn't understand or love her enough (the source of her long-suppressed desire to escape from them), nearly everyone can somehow be held responsible for the supposed crime-and seen as its unintended victim. When the truth and its fallout finally becomes clear at the end, the mood is not surprisingly claustrophobic and grim. Once again, Oates's gift for exposing the frailty-and selfishness-of humans is on display. (Feb.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Multiaward winner Oates's latest work focuses on the disappearance and apparent murder of a talented but socially isolated 19-year-old by her sister's ex-fiance. The multiple points of view allow us inside the minds of the shattered Iraqi war veteran accused of the crime, the deceased young woman's shocked and grieving family, and the young woman herself. In some ways, all are victims of wartime atrocities. Each perspective is involving; each character is complex and sympathetic. The result is a narrative that demands continual reevaluation of individuals and events, and readers are likely to race through the pages to unravel the mystery of what happened and why. The unexpected conclusion is very satisfying reading. This is a story about war, violence, mental illness, love, hatred, and, perhaps most of all, the will to survive and the healing power of forgiveness, all powerfully rendered by a master storyteller. -VERDICT Recommended for fans of family dramas from Oates, such as We Were the Mulvaneys. [See Prepub Alert, 8/5/13.]-Evelyn Beck, Piedmont Technical Coll., Greenwood, SC (c) Copyright 2014. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Dark events in Carthage, a town in upstate New York--a war hero returning from Iraq, a broken engagement, a mysterious murder--but not everything is as it seems. Carthage seems to embody the values of small-town America, for its citizens are independent and patriotic, but in early July 2005, things start to go dreadfully wrong. Juliet Mayfield, older daughter of former Carthage mayor Zeno Mayfield, is planning her wedding but finds her fiance, Brett Kincaid, broken and strangely different when he returns from duty in Iraq. Cpl. Kincaid is on a passel of meds, walks with a limp and has obviously experienced a severe trauma while on active duty. Meanwhile, Juliet's cynical and smart-mouthed younger sister, Cressida (the "smart one" as opposed to Juliet, the "beautiful one"), disappears one Saturday night after uncharacteristically visiting a local bar. The next day, Kincaid appears, hung over and largely inarticulate, and blood is found on the seat of his Jeep. Although his mother defiantly defends him as a war hero, Kincaid eventually confesses to having murdered Cressida. The scene then shifts to Florida, seven years later, when an eccentric psychologist is interviewing Sabbath Mae McSwain for an intern position. She's defensive about a name that seems obviously made up, though she carries a birth certificate around with her, and becomes visibly nervous when the psychologist starts probing about her past. The psychologist has been writing a series of exposs entitled SHAME! and is currently working to expose conditions on death row. The novel then shifts once again, this time back to the past, to reveal how Cressida transformed into Sabbath, what horrors Kincaid experienced in Iraq and how Cressida got entangled with Kincaid on his return home. Knotted, tense, digressive and brilliant.]]]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

After her lavishly imagined, supernatural historical novel, The Accursed (2013), Oates turns in the latest of her intensely magnified studies of a family in crisis and the agony of a misfit girl. Zeno Mayfield, a former mayor of the small Adirondack town of Carthage, and his wife, Arlette, have two daughters. Juliet is as good as she is beautiful. Cressida is "difficult." Smart, spiky, gnomish, and artistic, "inky-frizzy haired" Cressida may be autistic. Sweet Juliet gets engaged to handsome, civic-minded Brett Kincaid, who promptly enlists after 9/11. He returns severely injured, horribly scarred, and deeply traumatized. Then Cressida disappears, and grief decimates her loving family. Flashbacks to Brett's hellish experiences in Iraq carry a powerful indictment of war crimes, while a harrowing visit to a maximum-security prison by an enigmatic investigative writer exposes the horrors of incarceration and capital punishment. Oates' eerie, plangent, and gripping tale of a missing 19-year-old outcast and a betrayed warrior pivots on her interpretations of Cressida's medieval namesake, who abandoned one soldier for another, and Zeno's paradox concerning "infinity within the finite" as "a state of perpetual yearning." HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Oates will stay in the spotlight as The Accursed comes out in paperback, and Carthage is vigorously promoted in all media formats. Copyright 2013 Booklist Reviews.

When Zeno Mayfield's daughter can't be found, everyone in the small Appalachian town of Carthage joins in the hunt. Alas, the trail leads to an Iraq War hero with an association to the family—and terrible memories of battle. Further complicating matters, it seems that the missing girl may have been estranged from her family long before she vanished. With a 50,000-copy first printing.

Multiaward winner Oates's latest work focuses on the disappearance and apparent murder of a talented but socially isolated 19-year-old by her sister's ex-fiancé. The multiple points of view allow us inside the minds of the shattered Iraqi war veteran accused of the crime, the deceased young woman's shocked and grieving family, and the young woman herself. In some ways, all are victims of wartime atrocities. Each perspective is involving; each character is complex and sympathetic. The result is a narrative that demands continual reevaluation of individuals and events, and readers are likely to race through the pages to unravel the mystery of what happened and why. The unexpected conclusion is very satisfying reading. This is a story about war, violence, mental illness, love, hatred, and, perhaps most of all, the will to survive and the healing power of forgiveness, all powerfully rendered by a master storyteller. VERDICT Recommended for fans of family dramas from Oates, such as We Were the Mulvaneys. [See Prepub Alert, 8/5/13.]—Evelyn Beck, Piedmont Technical Coll., Greenwood, SC

Oates (The Accursed) returns with another novel that ratchets up the unsettling to her signature feverish pitch. Beginning with an attention-grabbing opener that begets addictive reading—Zeno Mayfield and a search party are on the hunt for Mayfield's missing 19-year-old daughter, Cressida, in the Adirondack woods—the story chronicles the creepy circumstances surrounding the girl's assumed murder. Was she, as many in the upstate New York town of Carthage suspect, beaten to death and dumped in the Black River by her older sister's ex-fiancé, Brett Kincaid, a decorated Iraqi War vet? Or did she, the "dark twisty" daughter prone to excessive self-loathing, play some perverse role in her own disappearance? What transports the story beyond a carefully crafted whodunit is Oates's dogged exploration of each character's culpability in the case, which spans nearly seven years. Between Kincaid's noncoerced but PTSD-fueled confession and Cressida's feelings that her family didn't understand or love her enough (the source of her long-suppressed desire to escape from them), nearly everyone can somehow be held responsible for the supposed crime—and seen as its unintended victim. When the truth and its fallout finally becomes clear at the end, the mood is not surprisingly claustrophobic and grim. Once again, Oates's gift for exposing the frailty—and selfishness—of humans is on display. (Feb.)