Mothers and Sons

A complex portrait of parallel lives on a par with the great Russian novels . . . incandescently smart and elegant . . . This is a story that feels as deep and real as life itself – a beautiful portrait of a mother and son

A complex portrait of parallel lives on a par with the great Russian novels . . . incandescently smart and elegant . . . This is a story that feels as deep and real as life itself – a beautiful portrait of a mother and son

The novel I’ve looked forward to most this coming year: Adam Haslett’s Mothers and Sons . . . I’ve loved his writing since Union Atlantic and this book is his best yet . . . The echoes of the Russian greats in the title aren’t misplaced – this is an epic family saga that packs an extraordinary emotional punch

A rising American superstar . . . Mothers and Sons packs a powerful punch which will secure [Haslett's] reputation . . . What Haslett does especially well is excavate the emotional inner lives of his characters . . . The final third of the book has the pace and revelation of a thriller. Ann may believe that “history is a mess” but Haslett shows quite brilliantly how the past can deliver blows decades on, and that sometimes a step backwards is what it takes to be properly in the present

Subtle, symphonic and satisfying . . . the secrets are deep and rich . . . Haslett wears his novelists skills lightly, never overwhelming the reader with a forceful style, but dropping in distinctive observations nonetheless

Riveting . . . Unfurling across multiple timelines with impressive, confident fluidity, Mothers and Sons is a powerful study of the impossibility of trying to hold back the tides of familial hurt and trauma. When the levee finally breaks, the outcome is both heartbreaking and ultimately hopeful

Mothers and Sons is Haslett’s best novel . . . he achieves new levels of moral depth and narrative push

One of the most psychologically astute fiction writers in America . . . Mothers and Sons could not be more timely . . .There’s a strange tension in Haslett’s work between urgency and introspection. Try as you might, you cannot rush this novel . . . His prose lies on the page with the intensity of a loosely coiled copperhead; you don’t even see the camouflaged danger until it strikes. He’s a master of incident and particularly of the ordinary line that’s transformed by his pacing and placement into something altogether devastating

There’s no better writer at chronicling the highs and lows of familial love. In Mothers and Sons , Haslett shows a family both torn by past trauma and battered by the social turmoil of the present . . . The chronicle of this complex mother and son pair satisfies one of the best reasons to read fiction: to understand others and their impossible burdens, to mourn when they stumble and celebrate when they survive

This beautifully written novel about the power of stories to redeem the past and reclaim the future is itself a tapestry of such narratives

Excellent . . . Haslett sets up this story with a delicacy that will not surprise anyone who read his beautiful 2016 novel, Imagine Me Gone , which featured a fretful, caretaking mother and her manic-depressive son. He is particularly good at depicting the ways—often admirable, sometimes blinding—that both Ann and Peter have been shaped by their work

Adam Haslett is the author of the story collection You Are Not a Stranger Here and the novels Imagine Me Gone and Union Atlantic. He has twice been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award and his books have been translated into over thirty languages. His journalism on culture and politics has appeared in The Financial Times, Esquire, The New Yorker , The Guardian , Der Spiegel , The Nation , and The Atlantic , among others. He lives in New York City.