THE BITCH POSSE by Martha O'Connor
If you missed it in hardcover....
it's now available in paperback
(i have a special interest in anybody named martha since my daughter has spent a large part of her life wondering how a mother comes to choose such a name for a child. my answer has always been a palms-up, goofy shrug.)
"Astonishing and truly remarkable ... tough, subtle, tense, authentic
and very beautiful. If this isn't really Alice Sebold, Donna Tartt or
Barbara Vine writing under a pseudonym, then Martha
O'Connor is a huge
new talent who is already about as good as it gets."
Lee Child, author of The Enemy
A circle's round it has no end; That's how long I want to be your friend.
Tear off the mask and stop pretending. Your Posse knows the truth.
Novelist Martha O'Connor makes a remarkable debut with THE BITCH POSSE
(St. Martin's Press; May 12, 2005), the dark and thrilling story of
three young women, their passionate friendship, and the terrible
secret that inextricably binds them together. Bestselling author
Jacquelyn Mitchard called the novel :dark, poignant, and only too
believable...a book that will walk alongside you, and haunt your dreams,
long after you turn the last page.: Her contemporaries have compared
her to Alice Sebold, Donna Tartt, and Joyce Carol Oates.
With bold and unflinching language, O'Connor weaves past and present
from the perspectives of three best friends, Rennie, Amy, and Cherry -
as rebellious teens and then as grown women in their mid-30's coping
with the repercussions of their actions. As high school seniors, the
girls form a tight circle of friends - which they name the Bitch Posse
- in order to lash out against tumultuous situations in their lives.
But as steadfast as their friendship is, it's not enough to protect
the girls from circumstances that cause all three of their lives to
spiral out of control. Rennie has a doomed affair with her married
drama teacher, which results in her bearing the psychic weight of an
abortion and a blighted love. Amy's parents think their daughter has
thrown over her bad-news friends, and upon learning their daughter has
become a drug and alcohol addict (not unlike themselves) they turn
their backs on her. Cherry's mother finds solace in cocaine, then
heroin, leaving her daughter to target her rage at someone, anyone,
over whom she has control.
Flash-forward to the present, where one girl is now a wife and
mother-to-be, trying to uphold a life of normalcy for herself and her
family. One is a writer with a sexual addiction that sucks her into
destructive relationships. And one is incarcerated in a mental
hospital - and has been since one fateful night fifteen years ago,
when a betrayal led them to commit a crime that profoundly changed
their destinies.
Fascinated by the struggle between good and evil within the human
spirit, Martha O'Connor delves into the dark side of human nature, the
intensity of female friendship, and the possibilities of redemption in
THE BITCH POSSE. Emotionally raw, upsetting, and provocative, this is
the introduction of a huge new talent and will leave readers reeling
this season. As Edmund White says, "The Bitch Posse is a debut worthy
of Joyce Carol Oates."
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Martha O'Connor grew up in Illinois and earned a BFA in Creative
Writing from Bowling Green State University in Ohio, graduating Phi
Beta Kappa, summa cum laude. Her poetry has been published in the
literary journals Stand, Poetry London Newsletter, Confrontation, and
Midwest Poetry Review, among others.
By turns a department store clerk, waitress, latte-maker, and
eighth-grade teacher, Martha O'Connor now lives and writes fiction and
poetry full-time in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband,
award-winning novelist and short story writer Philip F. O'Connor, and
their children.
martha's website
4 comments:
...my answer has always been a palms-up, goofy shrug.
hehe.
Moms....
Don't worry, Martha, you can always make the "th" a hard "t" and go Euro-cool.
Hey Martha,
It could have been worse...imagine being named after Debbie Reynolds and then expected to been as perky and freaking adorable as the Unsinkable Molly Brown. Ask any Debbie born in the 50's...a hideous legacy! I blame my leanings toward Crime and Mystery on it.
Hence the D.A. moniker. The next person who slips up and calls me Debbie may end up being a murder victim in my first novel. LOL!
I just read this. A-mazing. Exceptionally written. Very dark, and you somehow can't help turning the pages even though you know it's all leading to disaster. Check it out. She does half the book in teen POV, the other half in adult POV of the three girls. What an impact, is all I can say.
jason: i have to confess she's never minded the name, but other people always want to know how it happened. and of course they make the old lady connection. "was that your grandmother's name?' haha. surprisingly enough, when martha lived in sweden she found out that she had a great great granny with that name. we had no idea. and people there do drop the H. :D
d.a.: haha! oh, that's was so tempting to say debbie, but i restrained myself. i do imagine debbie as somebody who is perpetually in a good mood and energetic. but then there's deborah which is pretty cool and even a bit mysterious. but i think there are several mystery writers with that name. unlike the name anne. *wink* :D
kelly: i'm glad to get your input on the book. i've always thought it sounded fascinating. there's another one i have to pick up! and i'm very intrigued about the POV!
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