Sedating Elaine
A novel
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3.0 • 2 Ratings
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- $8.99
Publisher Description
An exuberant dark comedy about love, grief, sex, guilt, and one woman’s harebrained scheme to tranquilize her voraciously amorous girlfriend for a few days so that she might pay off her drug dealer, make soup, and finally get some peace and quiet.
"A brilliantly quirky, surreally funny story.... An intriguingly headstrong yet vulnerable character with an astonishing talent for making the worst possible life-decisions." —Sarah Haywood, best-selling author of The Cactus
Frances was not looking for a relationship when she met Elaine in a bar. She was, in fact, looking to drown her sorrows in a pint or twelve and nurse a broken heart, shattered by the gorgeous, electric Adrienne. But somehow (it involved a steady stream of beer and weed, as things often did with Frances) Elaine ended up in Frances’s bed and never left. Now, faced with mounting pressure from her drug dealer, Dom (and his goon, Betty), Frances comes up with a terrible idea: She asks Elaine to move in with her for real. Unfortunately, this seemingly romantic overture makes Elaine even more sex-crazed and maniacal with love. Frances fears she may never escape the relationship, so, given no choice, she makes the obvious decision: She will sedate Elaine.
A story as enthusiastically madcap and funny as it is smart and emotionally surprising, Sedating Elaine introduces a roster of unforgettable characters and an indelible, wildly exciting new voice in fiction.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Winter's sharp debut blends humor and emotional reflections with an exploration of trauma, substance abuse, and dysfunctional relationships. Frances, a kitchen worker at a London café, determines to break up with her girlfriend, the cheerful and sexually insatiable Elaine. Quiet and standoffish, Frances uses sex, drugs, and alcohol to numb the pain of being left by her ex Adrienne. After a debt to her weed dealer Dom reaches £2,000, Dom threatens to have her roughed up. She reverses her plans with Elaine and asks her to move in with her, planning to use Elaine's rent money to settle the balance. But when Elaine's subsequent jubilation becomes too suffocating to bear, Frances opts to drug her girlfriend with a sedative procured from Dom, just until the debt is paid and Frances can end their relationship. The outrageous plan soon goes awry, prompting a reckoning that forces Frances to consider her past relationships—with Adrienne, with her late father, and with the estranged mother who abandoned her—in a new light. Written in moving and candid prose, this takes an unflinching look at what troubled people are capable of, and what they might need to be healed. The result is amusing and touching in equal parts.
