Mothers and Sons - by Adam Haslett (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

A mother and son, estranged for years, must grapple with the shared secret that drove their lives apart in this enthralling story about family, forgiveness, and how a fleeting act of violence can change a life forever, by "one of the country's most talented writers" (Wall Street Journal)

At forty, Peter, an asylum lawyer in New York City, is overworked and isolated. He spends his days immersed in the struggles of immigrants only to return to an empty apartment and occasional hook-ups with a man who wants more than Peter can give. But when the asylum case of a young gay man pierces Peter's numbness, the event that he has avoided for twenty years returns to haunt him.

Ann, his mother, who runs a women's retreat center she founded after leaving his father, is hurt by the estrangement from Peter but cherishes the world she has built. She long ago put behind her the decision that divided her from her son. But as Peter's case plunges him further into the fraught memory of his first love and the night of violence that changed his life, he and his mother must confront the secret that tore them apart.

With unsurpassed emotional depth, Mothers and Sons reveals all that is lost by looking away from the past and the love that might be restored by facing it. In his spellbinding new novel, Adam Haslett demonstrates yet again his mastery of "a rich assortment of literary gifts" (New York Times).

Review Quotes

"Mothers and Sons could not be more timely. Haslett...is one of the most psychologically astute fiction writers in America...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. I'm not convinced that in real life relief from shame and guilt arrives like a full course meal, complete with petit fours and tea. But maybe that's why we need fine novels to take us where hope can only point to. Such is the consolation of art."--Ron Charles, Washington Post

"Excellent...Mr. 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."--Wall Street Journal

"Mothers and Sons" is Haslett's best novel. By limiting his area of inquiry, he achieves new levels of moral depth and narrative push."--New York Times Book Review

"This beautifully written novel about the power of stories to redeem the past and reclaim the future is itself a tapestry of such narratives. At the center is Peter Fisher, a gay immigration lawyer in New York who finds himself completely thrown off balance by Vasel Marku, a gay Albanian teenager driven out of his country by homophobic persecution. To right himself, Peter has to mend his estrangement from his mother Ann, who left his now-deceased father for a woman and runs a retreat center in Vermont. Together, they unearth a secret they buried long ago"--O, The Oprah Magazine

"Haslett's storytelling skill...is on quietly magnificent display... As much as both mother and son understand about the power of stories to harm and heal, they've failed to reckon with their own story, and the guilt and shame each has been carrying for decades. The momentum of the novel builds as long-held misunderstandings and resentments come to the surface, illuminating the meaning of what it means to be a mother, and a son, and culminating with a great sense of a weight lifted, of lightness and air."--Boston Globe

"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."--Vogue

"The echoes of the Russian greats in the title aren't misplaced--this is an epic family saga that packs an extraordinary emotional punch."
--The Guardian

"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."--Los Angeles Times

"Well-paced and elegantly written, Haslett's latest is a haunting work."--Minneapolis Star-Tribune

"Irresistible...​Themes of guilt, new beginnings, survival, and violence permeate the excellent and subtle story of characters grappling with events beyond their control, and the author delivers a deeply personal portrait of Peter's tenacious advocacy for his clients. This matches the heights of Haslett's best work."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"This deeply satisfying novel is a revelation--a thoughtful, psychologically acute, beautifully written examination of intersecting lives. The characters come alive on the page, commanding readers' attention. This novel is sure to receive accolades, and it richly deserves them."--Booklist (starred review)

"A family-in-crisis story that keenly captures deep-seated fears and regrets...The strength of Haslett's storytelling is its deliberation, slowly peeling back the veneers of Peter's and Ann's professional accomplishments and cool public personas to reveal storms of guilt and fear...Haslett's sophisticated grasp of the ways that people over-police their feelings makes it a remarkably acute and effective character study."--Kirkus Reviews (starred)

"Mothers and Sons is both moving and deeply compelling, a story about the search for our own humanity, and the lengths we will go to maintain it. A new book by Adam Haslett is always cause for celebration. He is one of our very best writers."--Ann Patchett, New York Times bestselling author of Tom Lake and The Dutch House

"Mothers and Sons is like sonar in a lake, pinging out everything submerged, the hidden stories, the shames and the joys. There's nothing else like it. Haslett's characters feel so real, their choices so hard, their lives so true. He is everything you want in a writer."--Andrew Sean Greer, Pulitzer Prize-winning and New York Times bestselling author of Less

About the Author

Adam Haslett is the author of the story collection You Are Not a Stranger Here and the novels Union Atlantic and Imagine Me Gone. He has twice been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, as well as a finalist for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award and a winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, the PEN/Malamud Award, the Berlin Prize, and the Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He currently directs the MFA Program at Hunter College in New York.