Told in fragments, the novel is somber, but the characters are alive even in their state of mourning. Her memories of that family tragedy and the miscarriage, though, are just as vivid. Yet the narrator keeps fantasizing about conversations they had in the earliest days of their relationship, back when she wasn’t yet the “‘I love you’ type” but found herself suddenly stepping over a new threshold of commitment and vulnerability. Before these devastating events, she and Asher reveled in “late nights and liquor and displays of whatever the hell we wanted.” After, they’re withdrawn from each other, keeping secrets and fumbling their attempts at connection. In Tiffany Clarke Harrison’s graceful, searing debut novel, a narrator - writing directly to her husband, Asher - picks apart her fears of parenthood, drawing connections between those apprehensions and a family accident, her recent pregnancy loss, and the police shooting of a Black boy named Noah, a quiet, anime-loving student in her photography class.
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