The Quiet and the Loud
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- USD 6.99
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- USD 6.99
Descripción editorial
“A writer to be reckoned with.” —Kathleen Glasgow, author of Girl in Pieces and You’d Be Home Now
A heartbreaking, hopeful, and timely novel about facing family secrets, healing from trauma, and falling in love, from the award-winning author of How It Feels to Float
George’s life is loud. On the water, though, with everything hushed above and below, she is steady, silent. Then her estranged dad says he needs to talk, and George’s past begins to wake up, looping around her ankles, trying to drag her under.
But there’s no time to sink. George’s best friend, Tess, is about to become, officially, a teen mom, her friend Laz is in despair about the climate crisis, her gramps would literally misplace his teeth if not for her, and her moms fill the house with fuss and chatter. Before long, heat and smoke join the noise as distant wildfires begin to burn.
George tries to stay steady. When her father tells her his news and the painful memories roar back to life, George turns to Calliope, the girl who has just cartwheeled into her world and shot it through with colors. And it’s here George would stay—quiet and safe—if she could. But then Tess has her baby, and the earth burns hotter, and the past just will not stay put.
A novel about the contours of friendship, family, forgiveness, trauma, and love, and about our hopeless, hopeful world, Helena Fox’s gorgeous follow-up to How It Feels to Float explores the stories we suppress and the stories we speak—and the healing that comes when we voice the things we’ve kept quiet for so long.
"Compelling and arresting" —Shelf Awareness (starred review)
"Powerful, heart-tugging" —Books+Publishing
"As deeply enjoyable as it is reflective . . . sweet and yet emotionally mature" —BCCB
"Brilliant" —Utopia State of Mind
"A sensitive portrayal of complex PTSD" —Booklist
"Lyrical and evocative . . . Vivid" —Kirkus
"Heartbreaking yet uplifting and hopeful . . . Highly recommend[ed] —EveryQueer.com
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Fox (How It Feels to Float) delivers an immersive, Sydney, Australia–set accounting of a teen struggling to overcome past traumas while dealing with her loved ones' varying conflicts. Whenever life begins to overwhelm 18-year-old George, she escapes to the peace and quiet of kayaking. But after she learns that her estranged father is dying of heart disease, she doesn't believe kayaking will help with her headspace, especially when she recalls a haunting memory: her father abandoning a then 10-year-old George on a kayak one night in the middle of a lake. He requests that she visit him in Seattle, saying he wants to make amends, but also asks that she not reveal his diagnosis to her mother. Meanwhile, George is unsure how to help her friend Tess, who is dealing with postpartum depression, and George's worries over Tess stall her budding romance with newcomer Calliope. Harrowing flashbacks told via George's vulnerable voice detail past experiences featuring her father's alcohol dependency, while visceral depictions of Australian wildfires add a palpable element of urgency that both mirrors and impacts George's desperation to take control of her life. George and Tess are assumed white; Calliope is of Sri Lankan descent. Ages 14–up.
