INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER LA TIMES BOOK PRIZE FINALISTNBCC JOHN LEONARD PRIZE FINALISTONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES’S MOST NOTABLE BOOKS OF 2017ONE OF THE WASHINGTON POST’S MOST NOTABLE BOOKS OF 2017ONE OF NPR’S ‘GREAT READS’ OF 2017A USA TODAY BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR AN AMAZON.COM BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR A BUSINESS INSIDER BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR“Impossible to put down.” —NPR“A novel that readers … YEAR
A BUSINESS INSIDER BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
“Impossible to put down.” —NPR
“A novel that readers will gulp down, gasping.” —The Washington Post
“The word ‘masterpiece’ has been cheapened by too many blurbs, but My Absolute Darling absolutely is one.” —Stephen King
A brilliant and immersive, all-consuming read about one fourteen-year-old girl’s heart-stopping fight for her own soul.
Turtle Alveston is a survivor. At fourteen, she roams the woods along the northern California coast. The creeks, tide pools, and rocky islands are her haunts and her hiding grounds, and she is known to wander for miles. But while her physical world is expansive, her personal one is small and treacherous: Turtle has grown up isolated since the death of her mother, in the thrall of her tortured and charismatic father, Martin. Her social existence is confined to the middle school (where she fends off the interest of anyone, student or teacher, who might penetrate her shell) and to her life with her father.
Then Turtle meets Jacob, a high-school boy who tells jokes, lives in a big clean house, and looks at Turtle as if she is the sunrise. And for the first time, the larger world begins to come into focus: her life with Martin is neither safe nor sustainable. Motivated by her first experience with real friendship and a teenage crush, Turtle starts to imagine escape, using the very survival skills her father devoted himself to teaching her. What follows is a harrowing story of bravery and redemption. With Turtle’s escalating acts of physical and emotional courage, the reader watches, heart in throat, as this teenage girl struggles to become her own hero—and in the process, becomes ours as well.
Shot through with striking language in a fierce natural setting, My Absolute Darling is an urgently told, profoundly moving read that marks the debut of an extraordinary new writer.
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This book is nasty and hateful. It was painful to read.
This book had me from the first chapter. What father walks his daughter to the bus stop with a beer? Disturbingly perhaps more than we know. Very compelling!
Disturbing, but I found the main character fascinating …
I am recommending this book with this caveat: You will love it IF you like psychological thrillers. I don’t read those anymore, but the book was highly recommended and so I read it. The writing is very good. The characters are well-drawn and realistic. The story, completely believable. Certainly it is a page-turner!
I know there are people with twisted minds who do awful things but I don’t care to read about them. This is not the type of book I would recommend for anyone.
The most painful book I have ever read. So sad.
Disturbing
I found the book written by a talent writer, but with a disturbing subject. I was unable to continue reading.
While the writing is good, the subject is horrifying. This “coming of age” story made me want to grab a gun and kill the nasty, sub-human father for his deeds, the author for putting pen to paper, then myself for allowing the visuals into my brain.
Turtle, a 14 year old girl, lives with her psychotic father who is by turns mentally, physically, sexually and verbally abusive. There is a plethora of vulgar words and unbelievable cruelty in this book. In spite of that, Turtle is such an absorbing character that I could not put the book down until I had finished it.
Stephen King called this book a masterpiece. How absolutely gut-wrenchingly true! The characters are unforgettable and the main character’s journey is harrowing and inspiring.
I picked up this book because of the recommendations in the email summary. The description did not do the story justice – it really should have had some kind of warning about the explicit and very disturbing content. It wasn’t just about ‘breaking free’ – it was about sexual and mental abuse at its darkest. I thought I would try and read through, but took another look at the reviews to see that it doesn’t get much better. I stopped reading. Like others have said, the memories will be there quite a while and you can’t undo them. As to the prose, i was irritated almost immediately. Like Stephen R. Donaldson, whose works I find extremely tedious to read, this author seems to delight in using unnecessary words (though not as many arcane ones) that you want to skip over instead of trying to absorb the picture he’s trying to paint.
Terrible !
I was very hard to read. The subject matter was quite upsetting.
This was a very well written, but an extremely dark and twisted book. Definitely not for the faint of heart. Actually too dark for me, but I’m sure others will like it. While the ending isn’t exactly happy, it’s at least hopeful.
Not suitable for young children.
Okay, so this might be the most difficult book I’ve ever read but so worth the hardship. The author’s talent for creating believable characters, the fine details of the Northern California region where they live, and the relationship between Turtle, her tormented, sick father, and the other adolescents and adults in Turtle’s life blew me away. Even when the situation was devastating, I couldn’t stop reading. As we follow Turtle’s life and her challenges, we become her silent cheerleader, and in the end, when she is forced to choose, her freedom lifts a giant weight from your shoulders.
Everything about this book was so good, though emotionally devastating, but the climax scene might be the most masterful I’ve ever read.
Gabriel Tallent’s debut novel, My Absolute Darling, received critical Acclaim along with warnings for its graphic content. It is difficult to read. Julia ‘Turtle’ Alveston lives in Mendocino, CA, with her father, a charismatic sociopath and survivalist who physically, mentally, and sexually abuses her continuously. Turtle knows she needs to escape but it won’t be easy. My Absolute Darling is oddly both gratuitous and clinical. Ultimately it lacked the emotional depth for me to be invested in this story of victim and survivor. It left a bad taste in my mouth.
Un-Put-Downable!!
This book was extremely disturbing and graphic, with unnecessary description and excessive profane language.