Indies Introduce

Fiction

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  History of Wolves, Emily Fridlund
  Atlantic Monthly Press, 9780802125873, January 3, 2017 (Fiction)
  

  From the very second I began reading Fridlund’s debut novel, History of Wolves, I was captivated and excited. You just know when you have something truly special in your hands. The voice of 14-year-old protagonist Linda reaches out and grabs you by the throat. This is a debut author immensely talented and fully in command of her craft.

  Susan Hans O’Connor, Penguin Bookshop (Sewickley, PA)
  
  

  Recounted by Linda, a 14-year-old ‘flat-chested, plain as a banister’ girl, this is a powerful and moving chronicle of a backwoods girl living off the grid, in the remains of a commune, with two diffident, non-conventional parents. Her sexual awareness is awakened by the attention paid to her by her history teacher (an accused pedophile), a new girl at school (‘She had dimples on her cheeks, nipples that flashed like signs from God through her sweater…’), and the young couple from the city in a new cabin near her home, with whom she hangs out and helps out and whose son she babysits for. The awkwardness of bridging her primitive home life with the opulence of the yuppie neighbors recalls universal adolescent memories of the fear of being different and the desire to belong. Flashbacks foreshadow a dramatic event that will shatter the innocence of Linda’s childhood. A stirring reminder of why we don’t really want to be young (adolescent) again.

  Darwin Ellis, Books on the Common (Ridgefield, CT)