Night Watch (Pulitzer Prize Winner): A novel (Unabridged)
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- $14.99
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
PULITZER PRIZE WINNER • LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD IN FICTION • A NEW YORKER BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR • From one of our most accomplished novelists, a mesmerizing story about a mother and daughter seeking refuge in the chaotic aftermath of the Civil War—and a brilliant portrait of family endurance against all odds
"A tour de force." —Tayari Jones, author of An American Marriage
In 1874, in the wake of the War, erasure, trauma, and namelessness haunt civilians and veterans, renegades and wanderers, freedmen and runaways. Twelve-year-old ConaLee, the adult in her family for as long as she can remember, finds herself on a buckboard journey with her mother, Eliza, who hasn’t spoken in more than a year. They arrive at the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum in West Virginia, delivered to the hospital’s entrance by a war veteran who has forced himself into their world. There, far from family, a beloved neighbor, and the mountain home they knew, they try to reclaim their lives.
The omnipresent vagaries of war and race rise to the surface as we learn their story: their flight to the highest mountain ridges of western Virginia; the disappearance of ConaLee’s father, who left for the War and never returned. Meanwhile, in the asylum, they begin to find a new path. ConaLee pretends to be her mother’s maid; Eliza responds slowly to treatment. They get swept up in the life of the facility—the mysterious man they call the Night Watch; the orphan child called Weed; the fearsome woman who runs the kitchen; the remarkable doctor at the head of the institution.
Epic, enthralling, and meticulously crafted, Night Watch is a stunning chronicle of surviving war and its aftermath.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
This Pulitzer Prize–winning historical novel contrasts the trauma of war with surprisingly bright moments from the 19th-century approach to mental illness. Twelve-year-old ConaLee’s father never returned home from the Civil War, leaving her and her mother, Eliza, defenseless when an itinerant man finds the pair and begins terrorizing them. The horrific abuse has left Eliza mute when she and ConaLee arrive at West Virginia’s Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum, an unexpected place of healing and hope. Author Jayne Anne Phillips immerses you in this difficult time and place as the POV shifts from one finely textured character to the next—with a trio of narrators bringing realism and immediacy to each one. Though the horrors Phillips describes are unflinching, we were amazed to hear about the kind, compassionate care that was practiced at the facility. (Quotes from its real-life superintendent Dr. Thomas Story Kirkbride are interspersed throughout.) Don’t miss this deeply moving tale of healing and survival.