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What people are saying about NIGHT SWIM“I loved this novel. It was just breathtaking and I was really left in awe. There was not a wasted word, or scene or emotion that did not resonate or ring true. The pages ached.”
--Caroline Leavitt, NYTimes bestselling author of Pictures of You "Jessica Keener steps boldly into the terrain of Eugene O'Neill, conjuring up the pathologies and quirks of a besieged Boston family in stark, quivering detail that never entirely distracts us from the looming sense of crisis. This gripping first novel announces the arrival of a strong, distinct and fully evolved new voice." --Jennifer Egan, Pulitzer Prize winner, National Book Critics Circle Award winner, author of A Visit from the Goon Squad “An amazing new literary voice, Jessica Keener explores the fine-laced network of tangled familial relations in language both bold and intricate. Night Swim is the deeply moving and devastatingly beautiful work of a fearless writer." --Sara Gruen, NY Times bestselling author of Water for Elephants "Jessica Keener has an ear for the nuances of family life and manages, in this book, a small miracle --describing, convincingly, a family suffering the rigidity and opaqueness of a small-scale tyrant, yet honoring his authority and treating his painful struggles with kindness. Keener's heroine, a 16-year-old girl impatient to achieve womanliness, is a marvel of curiosity, impulsiveness, and generosity. What a lovely book!" --C. Michael Curtis, Fiction Editor, The Atlantic “Reading this was pure pleasure. Just gorgeous. Jessica Keener’s Night Swim is a poignant and sensual examination of a life and a nation on the cusp of change. Sixteen-year-old Sarah brings us a moody and burgeoning wisdom as she pulls us toward secrets we recognize — the desire to hurry past pain and loss toward adulthood, the pull to belong and yet not be absorbed completely into the will of others. In a delicate balance of rebellion and compassion, Sarah teaches us to listen and hold tight to our dreams.” –– Susan Henderson, author of Up From the Blue, A Shelf Awareness top 10 pick for 2010 “NIGHTSWIM is a cool lovely gem of a novel. I loved this book. The writing is fearless, lyric and precise. The haunting story of a family broken apart and a stunning, fierce teenage heroine who is determined to do more than survive. Keener's debut is a small masterpiece. It glints with life and is written with such insight and compassion, we are moved.” Dawn Tripp, author of Game of Secrets "I could not put this book down. I related to so much of this, the whole demographic. Jessica Keener is an exquisite writer. Her observations are as good as good literature gets. Masterful. I tore through this at warp speed. Simple and gorgeous. I haven't read something with so much hunger in a long time." --Risa Miller, author of Welcome to Heavenly Heights, PEN Discovery Award winner. “This polished gem is damn near perfect. There is so much to admire-the luminous prose, the details that bring a time and place and family so vigorously to life. The main character, Sarah, is so real and vital—a breathing, complicated, yearning, hungry-for-life young woman who bears her mother’s loss in a unique way.” --Patry Francis, author of The Liar’s Diary Night Swim marks the debut of a brilliant novelist. With grace and compassion, Jessica Keener takes us back to Boston during the early 1970s. When maternal love is silenced at the untimely death of her mother, 16-year-old Sarah Kunitz finds her own voice through choices both sweet and sorrowful. Keener’s lyrical prose sweeps you into the story and onto a stage where Sarah’s here and now meet her yesterday for a flawless finish.” —Carolyn Burns Bass, founder of #LitChat, a More magazine top 20 "follow-worthy" pick. "NIGHT SWIM presents us with an entire world, drawn from our own recent past by means of the novelist's most important gifts: close observation and compassionate attentiveness. It feels real, and it feels true, and above all else it feels lived." --Jon Clinch, author of Finn, an American Library Association Notable Book "Overall, this one was near perfection…and I very rarely say that. This is an author I will be following." 5 stars, Books Like Breathing, review of Night Swim
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About Night Swim
"Keener’s observations perfectly capture a certain kind of 1970s adolescence: the adults who tried too hard, the sudden appearance of a joint when in the presence of older cousins, the way a grownup party could spin from fun to disturbing in a blink. Most exhilaratingly, she taps into the thrilling moments when a girl of 16 can see her future, whether in music or books or a boy’s smile. Sarah watches her mother’s rose garden after her death. Like her children, some “bloomed haphazardly while some wilted,’’ a living symbol of what goes on, no matter what."
"Like the adults in Rick Moody’s “Ice Storm,” the central couple in this novel of 1970s suburbia are remote alcoholics. “Love was something distant that retired to a room on the second floor,” Sarah, the 16-year-old narrator, says, referring to her stay-at-home yet absentee mother. This is a woman who makes a divot in the soil for her drink glass while tending her roses...This earnest debut centers on Sarah as she tunnels through new depths of loneliness...moving."
Keener is a big talent with a particular knack for detail and a finely tuned ear...she gives us a story that makes us cringe and lurch, laugh and, literally, weep. Her writing is never obvious, yet her lyrical prose will wow you. Even when describing the seemingly ordinary, Keener injects poetry. Sarah’s explorations allow readers to examine their own relationship with truth, sorrow, loss, longing and joy. Readers will be glad they dove into Night Swim.
"Jessica Keener's debut novel Night Swim is a masterfully told tale. Dysfunctional family dynamics are revealed in language evocative and honest, and her characters so well-drawn they could be our own kin.
The emotional depth of this novel has me constantly recommending it to friends in book clubs."
"Set in 1970's Boston high-society, Night Swim tells the tale of the Kunitz family, who hide their deep tensions behind a shimmering facade of parties and affluence before tragedy breaks their stable dance."
(Brookline Booksmith)
Feature articles
About a hundred feature articles published in The Boston Globe and other national magazines. Google my name as Jessica Keener or Jessica Brilliant Keener |
