- DESCRIPTION
- ABOUT THE AUTHOR
- EDITORIAL REVIEWS
A tense, page-turning psychological drama about the making and breaking of a family-and a woman whose experience of motherhood is nothing at all what she hoped for-and everything she feared.
Blythe Connor is determined that she will be the warm, comforting mother to her new baby Violet that she herself never had.
But in the thick of motherhood's exhausting early days, Blythe becomes convinced that something is wrong with her daughter-she doesn't behave like most children do.
Or is it all in Blythe's head? Her husband, Fox, says she's imagining things. The more Fox dismisses her fears, the more Blythe begins to question her own sanity, and the more we begin to question what Blythe is telling us about her life as well.
Then their son Sam is born-and with him, Blythe has the blissful connection she'd always imagined with her child. Even Violet seems to love her little brother. But when life as they know it is changed in an instant, the devastating fall-out forces Blythe to face the truth.
The Push is a tour de force you will read in a sitting, an utterly immersive novel that will challenge everything you think you know about motherhood, about what we owe our children, and what it feels like when women are not believed.
ASHLEY AUDRAIN previously worked as the publicity director of Penguin Books Canada. Prior to Penguin, she worked in public relations. She lives in Toronto, where she and her partner are raising their two young children. The Push is her first novel.
"Taut, chilling....Audrain has a gift for capturing the seemingly small moments that speak volumes about relationships." - New York Times Book Review
"Hooks you from the very first page and will have you racing to get to the end." - Good Morning America
"What happens when a mother doesn't love her daughter? Audrain's debut is a tense, chilling dip into the dark side of motherhood, narrated by Blythe, whose own upbringing raises the question: Can one inherit an inability to parent? The Push is uncomfortable and provocative, like a train wreck that demands your gaze." - The Washington Post
"There are enough novels about unreliable female narrators and neglectful mothers to fill a minivan... But what makes [THE PUSH] stand out from the rest is Audrain's nuanced understanding of how women's voices are discounted, how a thousand little slights can curdle a solid marriage and--in defiance of maternal taboos--how mothers really feel, sometimes, toward difficult children." - The Los Angeles Times
"This taut and tense hurricane of a debut is best devoured in one sitting." - Newsweek
"Fans of psychological thrillers, crack open this one about the relationship between mothers and daughters." - Good Housekeeping
"A chilling page-turner that asks provocative questions." - Real Simple
"A thrilling debut." - Harper's Bazaar
"Well thought out, carefully crafted, vividly realised and gripping... The Push turbo-charges maternal anxieties with a fierce gothic energy." - The Guardian
