Days of Wonder
A Novel
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
New York Times bestselling author Caroline Leavitt returns with a tantalizing, courageous story about mothers and daughters, guilt and innocence, and the lengths we go for love.
As a teenager, for a moment, Ella Fitchburg found love—yearning, breathless love—that consumed both her and her boyfriend, Jude, as they wandered the streets of New York City together. But her glorious life was pulled out from beneath her after she was accused of trying to murder Jude’s father, an imperious superior court judge. When she learns she’s pregnant shortly after receiving a long prison sentence, she reluctantly decides to give up the child.
Ella is released from prison after serving only six years and is desperate to turn the page on a new life, but she can’t seem to let go of her past. With only an address as a possible lead, she moves to Ann Arbor, Michigan, determined to get her daughter back. Hiding her identity and living in a constant state of deception, she finds that what she’s been searching for all along is a way to uncover—and live with—the truth. Yet a central mystery endures: neither Jude nor Ella can remember the events leading up to the attempted murder—that fateful night which led to Ella’s conviction.
For fans of Miranda Cowley Heller’s The Paper Palace and Allegra Goodman’s Sam, Caroline Leavitt’s Days of Wonder is a gripping high-drama page-turner about the elusive nature of redemption and the profound reach of love.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The haphazard latest from Leavitt (With or Without You) begins with 22-year-old Ella receiving an early release from a New York state prison after her conviction at 15 for the attempted murder of her boyfriend's father. Her mother, Helen, hopes to rehabilitate her daughter by providing "fierce love." Ella, however, is focused on finding the baby she gave up for adoption shortly after her incarceration. Her search takes her to Ann Arbor, Mich., where, in one of the novel's many implausible turns, she begins writing an advice column for a local newspaper. As she gets on her feet, she tries to befriend her daughter's adoptive parents while keeping her own identity a secret. The present-day story of Ella's quest alternates with sections centered on her teenage boyfriend, Jude, a wealthy, unhappy boy whose father physically abuses him. Leavitt provides depth by exploring Ella and Helen's complicated and sometimes conflicting maternal feelings, but her propulsive narrative is marred by a melodramatic conclusion and perplexing anachronisms ("evidence at Ella's trial involved a tea made of poisonous foxglove"). This fails to make the most of its potent ingredients.