State of the Union
A Novel
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3.8 • 13 Ratings
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- $15.99
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- $15.99
Publisher Description
From the New York Times bestselling author of Leaving the World comes the compelling story of a woman whose one choice, made decades ago, comes back to haunt her.
America in the 1960s was an era of radical upheaval–of civil rights protests and anti-war marches; of sexual liberation and hallucinogenic drugs. More tellingly, it was a time when you weren’t supposed to trust anyone over the age of thirty; when, if you were young, you rebelled against your parents and their conservative values.
But not Hannah Buchan.
Hannah is a great disappointment to her famous radical father and painter mother. Instead of mounting the barricades and embracing this age of profound social change, she wants nothing more than to marry her doctor boyfriend and raise a family in a small town.
Hannah gets her wish. But once installed as the doctor’s wife in a nowhere corner of Maine, boredom sets in... until an unforeseen moment of personal rebellion changes everything. Especially as Hannah is forced into breaking the law.
For decades, this one transgression in an otherwise faultless life remains buried. But then, in the charged atmosphere of America after 9/11, her secret comes out and her life goes into freefall.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Domestic ennui, sociopolitical commentary, and infidelity are at the center of this nicely paced if sometimes overheated family drama from Kennedy (A Special Relationship). In 1969, 18-year-old Hannah Latham's rebellion against her parents famous radical activist father, mentally unwell painter mother is to shoot for the simple life by marrying medical student Dan Buchan, getting pregnant, and moving to rural Maine. Before she knows it, she's carved out an unexciting life as a part-time librarian and part-time housewife until Tobias Judson, an acquaintance of her father with Weather Underground ties, comes knocking on her door. Fast forward to 2003: Hannah is a schoolteacher; her grown daughter flips out and disappears; her college best friend and sole confidante is dying of cancer; and decisions she made 30 years earlier come hurtling forward to again put into question what kind of life she really wants for herself. While the characters are stock and the points of conflict routinely overblown, Kennedy's emotionally charged, reader-friendly tale of a woman on the verge will please his fans.
