Cassandra Campbell’s lyrical, flowing narration beautifully supports this story about a woman’s journey of self-discovery. Susan Conley is the author of the memoir THE FOREMOST GOOD FORTUNE and the novel STOP HERE, THIS IS THE PLACE. At once urgent and contemplative, this new work focuses on Elsey, a painter and married mother living in China who has taken to drinking instead of creating art. Urged by her husband to find help, she attends a yoga retreat and discovers many truths, not the least of which about herself. Campbell’s lovely performance colors the characters with accent and personality, while also maintaining an audible neutrality. In doing so, she provides a narration that reflects Elsey’s attitude and offers listeners a respite from the increasing tension of this timely and timeless story. A.C.S. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine
Elsey Come Home: A novel
Narrated by Cassandra Campbell
Susan ConleyUnabridged — 5 hours, 49 minutes
Elsey Come Home: A novel
Narrated by Cassandra Campbell
Susan ConleyUnabridged — 5 hours, 49 minutes
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Overview
ONE OF THE “61 BOOKS WE'RE LOOKING FORWARD TO READING IN 2019”-THE HUFFINGTON POST
ONE OF THE “16 FICTION RELEASES TO WATCH FOR”-WASHINGTON INDEPENDENT REVIEW OF BOOKS
ONE OF THE “BEST NEW BOOKS COMING OUT WINTER 2019”-SOUTHERN LIVING
ONE OF THE “10 NEWLY-RELEASED BOOKS THAT WILL GIVE YOU AN EXCUSE TO STAY INDOORS THIS WINTER”-O MAGAZINE
“I loved, loved this novel” -Lily King* * * * * ***“What more can I say-perfect” -Judy Blume
“In this intricate, delicate-as-rice-paper novel, an American painter living in Beijing and trying to clean up her act at a yoga retreat makes gains in fits and starts, `a butterfly, flitting from leaf to leaf.'”-O Magazine
From the widely praised author of*Paris Was the Place-a shattering new novel that bravely delves into the darkest corners of addiction, marriage, and motherhood
When Elsey's husband, Lukas, hands her a brochure for a weeklong mountain retreat, she knows he is really giving her an ultimatum: Go, or we're done. Once a successful painter, Elsey set down roots in China after falling passionately for Lukas, the tall, Danish MC at a warehouse rave in downtown Beijing. Now, with two young daughters and unable to find a balance between her identities as painter, mother, and, especially, wife, Elsey fills her days worrying, drinking, and descending into desperate unhappiness. So, brochure in hand, she agrees to go and confront the ghosts of her past. There, she meets a group of men and women who will forever alter the way she understands herself: from Tasmin, another (much richer) expat, to Hunter, a young man whose courage endangers them all, and, most important, Mei--wife of one of China's most famous artists and a renowned painter herself--with whom Elsey quickly forges a fierce friendship and whose candidness about her pain helps Elsey understand her own. But Elsey must risk tearing herself and Lukas further apart when she decides she must return to her childhood home--the center of her deepest pain--before she can find her way back to him. Written in a voice at once wry, sensual, blunt, and hypnotic,*Elsey Come Home*is a modern odyssey and a quietly dynamic portrait of contemporary womanhood.
Editorial Reviews
★ 10/15/2018
Probing questions about how to balance motherhood, a career, marriage, and a drinking problem resonate throughout Conley’s excellent novel narrated by an American painter looking back on her past few years in China, which were mostly spent teetering on the verge of a breakdown. When Elsey’s Dutch husband, Lukas, suggests she attend a weeklong spiritual retreat, Elsey begrudgingly capitulates to save their crumbling marriage. But the experience isn’t as woo-woo as she expects. Instead, while learning to weather the dreaded “Talking Circle” and enduring the day of silence, she alternates between closing herself off from her emotions and ruminating on her demons, including the death of her younger sister when they were children, and her inability to “understand how to be obsessed with children and obsessed with painting at the same time.” Elsey also befriends Mei, an esteemed painter married to another esteemed painter, whose frankness about feeling trapped in a restrictive country and marriage gives Elsey perspective. Though Elsey continues to falter and obsess over past decisions after returning home, her growing ability to tackle previously insurmountable challenges (her daughter’s appendicitis, a visit to her childhood home, AA meetings, a return to painting) proves she is slowly learning how to “be a different kind of mother. A different kind of wife.” Conley (Paris Was the Place) hits the mark on a story line that feels both high-stakes and fine-tuned. But it’s the raw desperation of Elsey’s inner dialogue that elevates the novel, making for an honest and astute depiction of the human psyche. (Jan.)
Sometimes the structure of a novel so suits its content, so fully allows characters to inhabit the page, that it’s hard to imagine any other arrangement. So it is with Susan Conley’s twisty, absorbing new novel, with its brief urgent chapters that read like dispatches from near and far. . . . Conley takes her protagonist’s screw-ups and compresses them into small, dire proclamations. The effect is often bracing. Elsey thrives in a poetry of mirrors and self-repair. . . . Readers may come away from this book marveling at the small miracle they’ve just witnessed. . . . Elsey is that rare creation that evokes real life, defies predictability and disarms us at every turn. Conley has taken a jittery pile of loose ends and made a thing of beauty.”—Joan Silverman, Portland Press Herald
“The novel is an intimate declaration of independence. … Conley tells it with such understanding and compassion that readers will be hard-pressed not to finish the slender volume in one sitting.”—Steve Whitton, Anniston Star
“The central tension of Elsey's life is the impossible choice between being an artist and being a mother. Her thoughtful, vulnerable, honest articulation of her pain—told from a distant future vantage point—is what truly drives her story toward resolution.”—Shelf Awareness
“A beautiful, ethereal piece of writing—a look at the power of family, the nature of creativity and the dynamics of addiction. It's an exploration of one woman's psyche, a look both deep and broad into what makes a person tick, packed with emotional resonance and deftly-turned phrases.”—Allen Adams, The Maine Edge
“In Elsey Come Home, Portland author Susan Conley gives a startlingly honest voice to working mothers. Her mesmerizing sincerity rings a common bell.”—
Amy Canfield, Maine Women’s Magazine
“Elsey Come Home is a smart, wry, and immersive coming-of-middle-age story of growth and womanhood.”—Elizabeth Entenman, HelloGiggles “Best New Books to Read This Week”
“Beautifully written. . . . The intriguing descriptions of life in China are a reminder that Americans, like people of other nations, sometimes emigrate and make their home elsewhere. In the end then, this is a thought-provoking novel.”—Washington Times
“A surprising gem of a book”—Emma Snyder, WBJC Maryland
“Described as ‘perfect’ by Judy Blume herself, Susan Conley’s new novel follows Elsey, a woman living in Beijing struggling to reconcile her identities as painter, mother, expat, individual, and wife. When the novel opens, Elsey is drinking heavily and descending rapidly into misery. Her husband suggests she take part in a retreat, where she meets a handful of strangers who change her life. It’s a necessary look at the identity crisis women can face when the world forces them into boxes.” —Marie Claire
“Elsey used to be a recognized painter, but now she’s the wife of expat Danish musician Lukas and the mother of two girls under 10, and she’s tethered to their home in China. As the slim novel opens, she’s depressed and lost and in crisis; at Lukas’ insistence, she leaves the family for a weeklong retreat that will end up transforming her. Even within a few paragraphs of this exploration of motherhood and individuality, Elsey’s voice and emotional turbulence leap off the page.” —The Huffington Post
“A former successful painter is forced to take a hard look at her life when her husband hands her—along with a silent ultimatum—a brochure for a weeklong mountain retreat.” —Washington Independent Review of Books
“Probing questions about how to balance motherhood, a career, marriage, and a drinking problem resonate throughout Conley’s excellent novel . . . [Elsey Come Home is] an honest and astute depiction of the human psyche.” —Publishers Weekly (starred)
“Conley’s slim novel illustrates the power of storytelling as a process for healing. What entices and endures here is the voice: dreamy, meditative, hypnotic, and very real.” —Kirkus
“I loved Elsey Come Home. The exotic setting, the characters Elsey meets along the way—her husband, her little girls, her dilemma. And the writing, spare and lovely. What more can I say—perfect.” —Judy Blume, author of In the Unlikely Event
“Elsey Come Home is a delicious read, vivid and delicately wrought, and so very prescient with regard to the mother-child bond that it’s almost eerie. I kept finding myself thinking, how did she know? and how did she find the words? An engrossing, moving meditation on family, loss, creativity, secrets, culture, and the bonds that hold our lives together against the odds.” —Carolina De Robertis, author of The Gods of Tango
“Elsey’s voice is a triumph. It sings. The writing is exquisite and tells the story of someone who has lost herself to the point that the pain in her life threatens to divide her from the people she loves most. There is so much at stake here, and even the small moments resonate. I loved, loved this novel.” —Lily King, author of Euphoria
“What a quirky little gem of a book Susan Conley has written. I’m still trying to figure out how she created a character so seemingly lost to herself without losing me in the process. There’s genuine alchemy here.” —Richard Russo
“Susan Conley’s voice is so intimate and filled with such exquisite detail it was as if a friend was whispering Elsey Come Home in my ear. While Elsey is a character hemmed in by her own flaws and misgivings, her author is the opposite, showering us with emotional nuance and gorgeous writing that make this novel a showcase of modern domesticity with all its unpredictable complexities and triumphs. Anyone who has ever felt separate and finally comes together will find himself or herself in Elsey Come Home.” —Betsy Carter, author of We Were Strangers Once
“Elsey Come Home is a triumph, a book of powerful women and even more powerful tradition. Contemporary China comes vividly to life alongside American friendships, family, and fortune good and bad—love and illness, pleasure and addiction, connection and misunderstanding, brittle trips back home. I love Susan Conley’s sentences—spare but lyrical, hard-edged but melodic, not a word extra, a story so big no Talking Circle could ever contain it.” —Bill Roorbach, author of The Remedy of Love and The Girl of the Lake
“Elsey Come Home is a thing of wonder and beauty, a novel about faraway places, both internal and external. I read this in one thirsty gulp, and through its window was shown certain truths about the joy, pain, and intricacy of marriage, and of being. Susan Conley is a magical writer; this book is her magic.” —Mike Paterniti, author of The Telling Room
“I love Elsey—her vulnerability, and self-awareness, and her love for her daughters, which permeates the novel. This book is lush with colors, smells, and sounds, and has a compulsive, deeply gratifying shape. We’re allowed to witness Elsey in all her glory, even when she’s unable to see herself clearly.” —Lewis Robinson, author of Water Dogs
Cassandra Campbell’s lyrical, flowing narration beautifully supports this story about a woman’s journey of self-discovery. Susan Conley is the author of the memoir THE FOREMOST GOOD FORTUNE and the novel STOP HERE, THIS IS THE PLACE. At once urgent and contemplative, this new work focuses on Elsey, a painter and married mother living in China who has taken to drinking instead of creating art. Urged by her husband to find help, she attends a yoga retreat and discovers many truths, not the least of which about herself. Campbell’s lovely performance colors the characters with accent and personality, while also maintaining an audible neutrality. In doing so, she provides a narration that reflects Elsey’s attitude and offers listeners a respite from the increasing tension of this timely and timeless story. A.C.S. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine
2018-09-02
A yoga retreat on a mountain in China signals a turning point for an expatriate American painter.
"About a year ago my husband handed me a brochure for a retreat in a nearby mountain village. We were standing in our Beijing kitchen while the girls played make-believe dog at our feet. The brochure was more like a handmade pamphlet—four pieces of white computer paper folded in the middle and stapled three times along the crease." Elsey's husband, Lukas, a Danish-born musician who plays electronic dance music in clubs, knows his wife desperately needs something to get her back on track and can only hope that this retreat will be it. Elsey's not so sure, but she goes anyway, leaving her beloved daughters with their dad and taking along a full cargo of emotional baggage. The conflict between parenting and painting has put an end to what was an art career on the rise and has also led to a dependence on alcohol that is more serious than she has been willing to admit. At the retreat she will learn plank and forward fold, observe a day of silence, and participate in the dreaded Talking Circle, which Elsey sees as a good premise for a skit on Saturday Night Live. Joining her on the mountain is a cast of Chinese nationals and foreigners, all there in hopes of changing their lives. Most significant among them is Mei, half of an internationally famous artist couple, for whom the retreat is an attempt to break from her difficult husband; she becomes something like a friend. As Elsey sorts through the memories of the yoga retreat and the year following, as well as older hurts and losses, Conley's (Paris Was the Place, 2013) slim novel illustrates the power of storytelling as a process for healing.
What entices and endures here is the voice: dreamy, meditative, hypnotic, and very real.
Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940169095036 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Penguin Random House |
| Publication date: | 01/15/2019 |
| Edition description: | Unabridged |
Read an Excerpt
Chapter One
About a year ago my husband handed me a brochure for a retreat in a nearby mountain village. We were standing in our Beijing kitchen while the girls played make-believe dog at our feet. The brochure was more like a handmade pamphlet—four pieces of white computer paper folded in the middle and stapled three times along the crease. There was a grainy photo of a cement terrace on the cover, and a more alarming photo of people sitting in a room with their eyes closed, and text under the photos that explained something called “a day of silence” and yoga and the chance for participants to reinvent themselves. My husband, Lukas, told me these things would make a good week’s vacation for me, and he smiled while I looked at the photos, but it was a distant smile.
He went back to his bowl of rice, and I pressed myself against the edge of our stove until my lower back hurt, and I felt so lonely I almost cannot say. I knew if I went to this village, the week would pass slowly and I’d be changed, and that this was the point of him sending me there, but also that Lukas and I might not ever find each other again.
I’d recently had a small surgery with my thyroid, and the Chinese doctor said I would get better, and he was right and so I did. But I’d been in and out of hospitals that previous winter, and when I was home I lay on the couch while Lukas and the girls continued on with their lives. Myla was eight. Elisabeth was seven. They sweetly cleared their plates and cups from the table and put them in the dishwasher upside down. Lukas often read the bedtime stories, and I saw he was trying hard to help me, but that I wasn’t needed as much as I thought, and that I must learn how to be a different kind of mother. A different kind of wife. It still feels like that now while I write this. That I cannot go back to the way I was before.
I will also say that when Lukas handed me the brochure in our kitchen I didn’t know how to be in a marriage. A real marriage. I’m not sure he did, either. He was from Denmark and had lived in Beijing for fifteen years, making music, and he stormed about the government’s crackdown on journalists and rising nationalism, but I’m not sure he’d ever learned how to really listen.
The day before I left for the retreat we took the girls downtown to a Japanese restaurant called Hatsune, which is lined with dark wood and tatami and serves large ceramic bowls of ramen and a sweet, sticky white rice Myla and Elisabeth love. After the rice got served I told the girls I was going away for the week to a tiny village called Shashan, and they stared at me with their grave eyes and clouds of hair. Then the fresh lemon sodas arrived, and neither of them seemed to register my announcement again, even though it was a rare announcement because I hardly ever left them. They played tic-tac-toe with a small pad of paper and pens I’d brought in my bag, and got up to look at the oversized catfish in the aquarium.
During the meal Elisabeth politely asked for a mayonnaise sandwich even though Hatsune was her favorite restaurant in Beijing, and she has always hated mayonnaise and refused to eat anything with mayonnaise on it. When we got home, Lukas made her the mayonnaise sandwich, and I stayed with her in the kitchen while she ate it so Lukas could put Myla to bed. There are two steel stools with black matte leather seats at the end of the stone counter, and Elisabeth and I sat on these while she ate the whole sandwich, which became, I think, a kind of statement. Her long hair was tucked behind her ears, which saved it from getting in the mayonnaise, and she didn’t say anything else about my leaving for the mountains.
Chapter Two
When Elisabeth was done with the sandwich, I walked her to her room and she lay on her bottom bunk, and I hadn’t closed the curtains yet, so we could still see the skyline and the enormous Chinese TV building so famous people come from around the world to look at it. From our apartment it resembles a pair of gray pants. So big I cannot even begin to explain it, and Elisabeth is often in awe of this building. Me too. How could people even get inside that building?
We live downtown in a high-rise near the most gigantic train station. When we moved here just before Myla was born, I circled the train station on my map with indelible marker so when I got lost I could take out my map and try to find my way home.
Elisabeth rolled over on her stomach in the bed. “Imagine,” she said, “if you spoke wolf language. I mean really spoke it. Would you live with the wolves and leave your mother and father and never come back?”
She often asked me questions that involved leaving our family, and I didn’t want her to leave our family, and I told her this. Then I said, “Living with wolves would be exciting, and if you didn’t like it you could come back.”
She looked at me like this was an acceptable answer, and I felt I’d passed a test, which is how I often felt with Elisabeth. Like she was administering a series of small philosophy exams, which were essential I pass in order to be allowed to continue being her mother.
I stood and pulled the blue curtains closed. This was more curtain than I’d encountered in a room, because the picture window was that big. A sliver of light from the noodle house below cut through the gap between the curtains and fell on the rug, and Elisabeth often said it looked like the scar on Harry Potter’s forehead.
The rug was hard like turf because it was laid down over concrete, and I’d never seen so much concrete before in my life until I lived in China. Elisabeth asked me what God I believed in, and I’m not sure if this interrogation was already happening before I had the thyroid surgery, but it threw me, because I often asked myself the same question privately. I told her I believed in the God of Family. “You know. The God who keeps families together forever and ever, so they are never apart.” Lying was the thing she disliked most of all, but I used to believe it was a way to spare her.
“But what do you really believe in, Mom?”
I smiled for how well she knew me. She’d already changed into the blue sweat suit, because she required being fully dressed for school before she got out of bed in the morning, and I no longer argued with her about this. But it was quite hot in her room and her face was flushed.
“Because I believe when you die,” she said, “you go to heaven for thirty years and then you come back as a cheetah because you want to be that fast.”
“Okay. Well, what I believe in is my love for you. That’s what I believe.”
I was trying to calm her mind so she’d be able to sleep. I could still mostly get away with naming my emotions for her explicitly. Maybe they were emotions I couldn’t fully name with my husband. I feared once she got just a little older, it would be over and she wouldn’t let me speak these things any longer, which has turned out to be mostly true. But there was this sweet time when I got to say them, and it has meant a lot.
Sometimes the streetlights outside her room flickered, and they began doing it then—blinking on and off, and the light landed on the strip of rug underneath the gap in the curtain and made the shapes. “Let’s go to sleep now,” I said.
I wanted her to sleep so I could pack. I also wanted a drink. I’d begun wanting one every night that winter after I put the girls to bed. I can’t fully account for it, but I will say that it didn’t feel like anything really happened during those days until I had a drink. I wasn’t painting, and I wasn’t with the girls doing what some people call parenting, because I was so often on the couch after the surgery. The girls tested me, and I tired more easily. They were still young and wanted things from me, as they should. Food and kisses. I gave them all of this.
I’d certainly drunk before my surgery, but never with intention. And now I thought I might be sicker than the doctors had said, and I was too in a hurry to return to my private conversation with the world about this. It sounds odd. My fear. I was slowly getting better but I couldn’t stop the worries, and I thought it was a secret how afraid I’d gotten.
You hear it and don’t understand when women say they lost themselves, because it seems overdone, and there are four hundred million people in China living on a dollar a day, so cry me a river.
There’s a small, fetid canal outside our apartment where a handful of old men from the hutong fish for carp and catfish. Elisabeth became fixed on these men out our window and often made us walk to the canal to watch them. She was a willful child like this and could take up a lot of the day, but I had no excuse for not painting in the two years leading up to my illness. What I will say is that I couldn’t understand how to be obsessed with my children and obsessed with my painting at the same time. I thought both called for obsession. I had a narrow view of the world and I was younger then, but really I was naïve.
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