Somebody Else's Daughter

September 29, 2008
Brundage's second novel concerns ugly secrets that lie beneath the glossy veneer of a wealthy town and popular school in the Berkshires, waiting to be exposed by three new arrivals: a sculptor, her son and a writing teacher who gave up his daughter for adoption many years ago. Thrillers often make great audiobooks, because they offer frequent heart-stopping twists and turns. But this literary thriller, with its careful, delicate writing and a slow buildup to a powerful, sudden—and fairly predictable—denouement, is less suited to audio. Despite Bernadette Dunne's considerable efforts, the reading drags from time to time. Mark Bramhall only voices the prologue; the remainder of the book belongs to Dunne, who ably evokes both genders and is particularly skilled with New England accents. Despite the slowness of the story and patience required of the reader, this is a satisfying audio experience. A Viking hardcover (Reviews, May 26).

May 26, 2008
A surfeit of characters and subplots weigh down Brundage's overwrought second novel (after 2005's The Doctor's Wife
). Seventeen years after San Francisco heroin junkies Nate and his then wife gave up their infant daughter, Willa, for adoption to a wealthy couple in Stockbridge, Mass., Nate has cleaned up his act and landed a job as a writing instructor at Pioneer, the elite private school Willa attends in the Berkshires. Everyone has something to hide: the head of Pioneer is stuck in a loveless marriage with his mentally unstable wife; Willa's adoptive father owns a lucrative porn studio. Willa grapples with peer pressure and her feelings for Teddy Squire, the school's newest bad boy, while Nate falls for Teddy's sculptor mother. As tensions near the boiling point, past indiscretions and long-buried secrets threaten to spill over and ruin the superficially idyllic community. Though the ingredients exist for a powerful drama, readers will be disappointed when the suspense fizzles early on and never reignites. 4-city author tour.

Mark Bramhall starts the story with a high level of drama as he portrays Nate Gallagher, a young man who is deeply in love with both his lover, Cat, and with heroin. The pair are driving across the country to deliver their baby daughter, Willa, to adoptive parents. Bernadette Dunne's narration takes over 17 years later as Nate, no longer a drug addict, but now a failing writer, takes a teaching job at Pioneer School, where Willa, with whom he's had no contact all these years, is a student. The result is a conflict between fathers, biological and adoptive, as well as a tangle of subplots involving the secrets and sordid pasts of a multitude of characters. Dunne expertly juggles the roles and projects a tension that helps the various subplots build to a dynamic conclusion. S.W. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine