Iodine

This gripping production is a tour de force, a tale told by the unreliable narrator to end them all, a compellingly intelligent, emotionally shattered college student named Trace, who keeps losing track of what is real, who she is, and how she got that way while continuing to function well, even brilliantly. Trace explores mythic archetypes in her academic work, but slowly the listener realizes she is also living in a world of them. Haven Kimmel not only writes like an angel, she has a gorgeous warm voice and skills any actor would envy. I can't imagine a better narrator to present Trace's searching, terrible confusion, her incantatory understanding of the world, and the utterly harrowing truth about her past. Stunning work in every way. B.G. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine

Starred review from May 19, 2008
In her fourth novel, Kimmel (The Used World
; A Girl Named Zippy
; etc.) offers a beautifully wrought portrait of the brilliant and psychotic Trace Pennington, a runaway now scraping by in an Indiana farmhouse while completing her final year of college. Trace excels in school despite her abject poverty and seems destined to enter the world of academia. However, Trace is haunted by a disturbing personal history, hinted at via dreams, startling recollections and entries in her journal. Her idiosyncrasies and antisocial behavior intensify as her thoughts are increasingly intruded upon by an abusive past and complicated relationships with her family, and when Trace begins a relationship with the worldly Dr. Jacob Matthias, her inner life rapidly disintegrates into the surreal. Her fierce intelligence remains, and she battles her madness and dark memories by moving in and out of her own imaginings. Kimmel skillfully weaves together Trace's lucid moments and her diminishing sanity, providing a full picture of a troubled woman whose identity, past and present are repeatedly called into question.