A young woman gathers intimate stories about pregnancy, motherhood, and the nature of female relationships, in this profound and provocative novel.
'A brilliant debut, both coolly empathetic and searingly personal ... Anna Hogeland writes beautifully, with unwavering passion and insight, about the complexities of motherhood and female relationships.' - Jess Walter, bestselling author of The Cold Millions
'There were other women, how many other women, who had felt and wanted what I'd felt and wanted, and felt and wanted differently too. Anywhere I've been and will go next, there they will be.'
Twelve weeks pregnant for the first time, Anna speaks to her sister on the other side of the country and learns she has just miscarried her second child. As this loss strains their bond, and complications with Anna's own pregnancy emerge, her tenuous steps towards motherhood are shadowed and illuminated by the women she meets along the way, whose stories of the babies they have had, or longed for, or lost, crowd in.
The Long Answer is a stunning novel of secrets kept and secrets shared. Deeply empathetic and hugely absorbing, it unravels the intimate dynamics of female friendship, sisterhood, motherhood and grief, and the ways in which women are bound together and pulled apart by their shared and contrasting experiences of pregnancy, abortion, miscarriage and infertility.
About the Author
Anna Hogeland is a psychotherapist in private practice, with an MSW from Smith College School of Social Work and an MFA from UC Irvine. She lives in Vermont.
Industry Reviews
'A brilliant debut, both coolly empathetic and searingly personal, a powerful bridge between fiction's two current modes. Anna Hogeland writes beautifully, with unwavering passion and insight, about the complexities of motherhood and female relationships.' - Jess Walter, New York Times-bestselling author of The Cold Millions
'An introspective, psychologically astute, and engaging debut... a heart-rending tale that blurs the line between fiction and reality...A startling meditation on grief and family and betrayal and the stories we tell about ourselves.' - Kirkus starred review
'In concentric circles of stories told and stories secreted away, The Long Answer is about women making life and losing life and about fertility itself - the promise and the more complicated truth. This beautiful novel tugs at friendship, marriage, family and women in moments of heartbreaking and miraculous transformation.' - Ramona Ausubel, author of Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty
'A brilliantly constructed novel about women, and about the power of love in the heart of one woman through whom these female souls are elucidated, their passions, their terrible losses, and their bravery. These characters breathe on the page, and their stories are moving and involving. Anna Hogeland is a wonderfully talented writer.' - Richard Bausch, PEN/Malamud and Dayton Literary Peace Prize-winning author
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