The Barter

July 14, 2014
Motherhood is the destabilizing bond that nearly undoes two women linked across a century in Adcock’s suspenseful debut. Former attorney and new mother Bridget is sitting up with her wailing 10-month-old daughter, Julie, when she first senses a ghost in her Austin, Tex., home. The ghost appears to be the spirit of a dead woman. Or is it? Sometimes the presence looks like nothing more than an enormous white cloud. What’s clear is that Bridget is conflicted, whether about leaving her job; relying on her husband, Mark, as he spends more and more time at his tech startup; or indulging her own fears and anxiety when “she should be grateful.” As Bridget spins out in the suburbs, the narrative travels back to 1902 to introduce Rebecca Mueller, 20 years old and newly married. Rebecca struggles against her temper, impulsive nature, and “smothering moments of panic” while negotiating the transition from doctor’s daughter to farmer’s wife in the Texas Hill Country. Adcock builds tension with the ghost’s periodic visitations, but the novel’s real concern lies in the more mundane but no less weighty issue of how fear and self-doubt can corrode marriages and families. Agent: Betsy Lerner, Dunow, Carlson & Lerner.

August 1, 2014
A ghost, hungry for a love she was too proud to seize, haunts a young mother. Adcock's (Hipster Haiku, 2006, etc.) debut novel skillfully interweaves the stories of Bridget and Rebecca, two women a century apart bound by the sacrifices inherent to marriage and motherhood. In 1902, Rebecca marries John Hirschfelder, willingly leaving her city home for a hard life as a farm wife. But her wedding night leaves her cold, and her anger at her own inability to embrace her marriage begins to fester. Soon enough, John's passivity and her barely concealed fury lead to fits of passion. Rebecca's mother had died shortly after childbirth, so Frau, Rebecca's father's cousin, helped raise her. Of the many stories Frau told her, the one of her mother's bartering an hour of life for her daughter's happiness troubles Rebecca the most. She wonders what she might sacrifice for her own child. One hundred years later, in the same Texas farmhouse, Bridget sits in the wee hours with her 10-month-old daughter, Julie. Giving up her job to be a full-time mother, at least for a while, seems like a good idea, but she's always so tired, which makes her fly off the handle at everything Mark does wrong. Of course she'd sacrifice her own life for her daughter, but what if Julie died? As Bridget considers this alarming possibility, the very air shifts, and the musty, earthy smell of the small stream running through their property rises. A ghost struggles to shape itself, looming over Bridget and Julie. In the days to come, Bridget scrambles to appease the ghost and save her family from its peculiar hunger. The metaphor of the barter, however, seems awkwardly imposed and too simple for the complex frustrations of women then and now. A tale of troubled souls far too easily resolved.

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September 1, 2014

New mother Bridget has given up her career as a lawyer to stay at home with her daughter in a comfortable Texas suburb. Resentful about her sacrifice, she feels plagued by picture-perfect mothers and family-friendly cookouts. Bridget tactfully plays the part in her new role, doing her best to fit in with the other caretakers in the neighborhood, until she discovers a ghost haunting her home. The apparition drives Bridget to the edges of madness, distancing her from her husband and evoking fear in their daughter. In a parallel story taking place nearly 100 years earlier, Rebecca leaves her family's pleasant home in town to become a farmer's wife. The similar narratives of Bridget and Rebecca reflect the trials of early motherhood, discontentment at home, and the strains of marriage. VERDICT Like Curtis Sittenfeld's Sisterland, Adcock's debut novel weaves the doldrums of early motherhood with the supernatural. However, her plot is unevenly paced and will leave readers wishing this ghost story were more suspenseful. [See Prepub Alert, 3/31/14.]--Emily Hamstra, Univ. of Michigan Libs., Ann Arbor

Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

August 1, 2014
Adcock's unconventional ghost story features two young women separated by a century but bound by eternal questions of love and loyalty. Attorney Bridget has given up a promising and fulfilling career to be a stay-at-home mom but experiences an unexpected void in her life that is increasingly occupied by a spectral presence invading her home and her subconscious. In 1902, Rebecca marries a young farmer, but soon rejects him, lavishing all her love and attention on their young son. As the stories of these two women struggling to cope with the demands, expectations, and disappointments of motherhood and marriage intertwine, tensions mount, and sacrifices are exacted. Eerie and atmospheric, this psychological thriller will twist its way into readers' psyches.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)