Joyce Carol Oates is a master writer and for good reason. Pursuit is Abby's story - from her nightmares to her family history, this short book explores tough topics. PTSD, sexual assault, domestic violence....it's all there.

This isn't a book where a reader will fall in love with a character or a story. This isn't a light-hearted family romp. This is dark, gritty and painful to read. JCO is at the top of her game, and still putting out masterful work.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Joyce Carol Oates has long been on my list of authors to try. So I finally did, and read this novel about a woman who gets married but steps in front of a bus, trying to flee the voices in her head. The rest of the short novel is about the voices and really shifts off of who I thought would be the main character. I'm not sure if this is typical of JCO but I found the pacing to be a little uneven and the violence to be more than I usually like in books. But she may just not be for me.

ETA: When I posted this review in Instagram and Litsy, I got a lot of feedback from people who said that JCO writes in multiple genres and her books are not all the same. Also many people suggesting I should try We Were the Mulvaneys, which might be more my speed.

Why did Abby step in front of a bus on the morning after her wedding? Abby's only 20 and she's just married Willem, who knows he doesn't know everything, or even much of anything about her except that he loves her. This novella hits a lot of hard spots as Abby's story unfolds. Her parents left her in the care of an aunt, who had issues, and then there are the parents. What a mess of a life and it's a miracle that Abby's made it this far. Thanks to net galley for the ARC. This is classic, well written and plotted Oates.

A Sad and Dark Mystery!

A young woman of twenty suffers from horrible nightmares but she is looking forward to her future with Willem, her husband of one day. On this morning (the day after her wedding) Abby is hit by the bus that she had just stepped off from. While Abby is convalescing from her traumatic injuries in the hospital, a background story is told of all the events that had caused her to have the nightmares that have plagued her throughout her life and then Willem discovers that he did not have a clue to the person who has become his bride.

I am sorry to say this story was not for me. Of course, "Pursuit" was well-written but I found it depressing and dark without any real suspense or tension. It was a fast read and the storyline was interesting but for me it was just a sad and dark drama. if you are a fan of Joyce Carol Oates, I recommend reading this book but (IMO) it just did not rise to a suspenseful thriller.

I want to thank the publisher "Grove Atlantic Mysterious Press" and Netgalley for the opportunity to read this book!

I have given a rating of 3 Wavering Stars!!

I found the writing bothered me from the very beginning, I hate that stream of conscious style writing. The story had me curious enough to keep reading through but I never really felt engaged in the book and just wanted it to be over.

I've come to the conclusion that Joyce Carol Oates is just not for me. I hung in there until the book was 70% finished--about the time that the story finally started to get meaty and deal with the skeletons in the grass. But by that time I was bored and didn't care about the characters. I had to to DNF,

The morning after her wedding, Abby steps in front of a bus. Was that a moment of distraction or self-destruction? We don’t know and neither does her new husband Willem. During her long recovery, Willem probes her nightmares and her past to try to understand. He is in pursuit of the truth while Abby has long been in pursuit of belonging and escape from that history Willem is so anxious to uncover.

Pursuit slowly uncovers Abby’s traumatic history, growing up in the care of relatives. Her favorite and longest caretaker was her troubled, addiction-prone aunt Tricia. She has fled her hometown for the city where no one knows her history, adopted a new name, and left behind her history of abandonment. But her dreams tell her a different history, one that is far more tragic.

The narrative point of view shifts from Abby to Willem to her mother and father, telling readers a history unknown to Abby, though perhaps she knows more than she thinks. The father returned from war traumatized by it, violent, and angry. He embodies the toxic masculinity that thinks of his wife, and his daughter as extensions of himself, as belonging to him. The mother is frightened, seeking safety for herself and her daughter, most of all for her daughter. The mother and father have starkly different stories, but I think readers will easily identify who is telling the truth.

Pursuit is a short novel that deeply troubled me. It is well-written. Really, is it possible for Joyce Carol Oates to write poorly? Nonetheless, I hesitate to recommend this without warning that there is a death in this book that is deeply disturbing and cruel. So much so, I don’t know if anyone has ever done something so vile. It made me physically ill, which speaks in part to Oates incredible narrative skill.

Oates often explores violence and its grip on the American psyche. She has an uncanny ability to create characters alien to my worldview, and surely to hers as well, who are still people we can understand and identify with. In A Book of American Martyrs, she takes us into the world of anti-abortion fanaticism and a different kind of toxic masculinity. I don’t think she succeeds as well in making this father as fully realized as she usually does. Perhaps because this book is shorter, perhaps because we don’t see the progressive shift in his thinking, but come to him after the war after PTSD has fractured his identity. That makes this a slightly less interesting book compared to her usual work.

Pursuit will be released October 1st. I received an e-galley from the publisher through NetGalley.

Wow! A jaw-dropping dark thriller. Fast paced and there are situations in it that have never been thought of before. Will definitely give goosebumps!

It has been a long time since I have read anything by Joyce Carol Oates. This was different than the previous novels of hers that ai have read. This was more poetic and lyrical than I am use to. It did take me a little time to get the flow of the writing, but once I did I really enjoyed it.

This is about Abby. The day after her wedding she is taking the bus to work and suddenly needs to be off the bus. After she gets off she steps in front of the bus and gets hit. Her husband then tries to figure out if it was on purpose or an accident.

It’s a bit of a strange read but an enjoyable one.

Thank you too Netgalley for the book in exchange for an honest opinion. I give this a 3.5

4-5 stars! I love, love, love dark thrillers and this one was definitely one that filled my dark heart! Well written, fast paced, intriguing, and shocking, all mixed in with the right amount of darkness to give the reader plenty of thrills and chills! I highly recommend!
Will be bidding this up!

My first Joyce Carol Oates, and won't be my last. Abby Hayman is a young adult who suffers from nightmares. The day after she marries her husband, Willem, she gets off her bus and runs out into traffic. Was this an accident, or did she do it on purpose? The narrative switches POVs, and while Abby is recuperating in the hospital, we get some more of the backstory of their relationship from Willem's perspective. It's clear that Abby has secrets she has kept from Willem and over the course of her recovery the entire horrific story is revealed.

The author users stream of consciousness, which is not a technique that I enjoy; however in this story it worked really well to ratchet up the tension, and despite the horrific content, this was a compulsive read that I did not want to put down once I started. The book is short, and I'm amazed with what the author accomplished here in her characterizations and story.

If like me, you have always been curious but intimidated by Joyce Carol Oates, I would check out this Pursuit. It is certainly literary, with lots to unpack regarding structure, POV, the title, characterizations, etc., but is also a compelling, readable story with a mystery.

Eyes open. Eyes shut.

Nightmares have a way of seeping into the cracks.

Abby Hayman has been suffering from the same haunting, repetitious nightmares for years. Her brain sorts through the carnage of endless treks through grassy fields and the horror of what lays tangled in the weeds. Waking exhausted, she stumbles through her day only to return to the same mind channel again and again.

But Abby has met someone at the County Services where she is employed in Hammond, New York. She specializes in the rehabilitation for the blind. Having just turned twenty, Abby is a young soul entrapped in the weighted spirit of her past. We'll come to see the flickering light under the door of that past as this story unfolds.

William Zengler has fallen head over heels for the fresh and freckled Abby. He's currently taking classes in Pre-Med at the university. He and Abby are soon married even though his family keeps questioning him about Abby and her lack of details in regard to her own background and family. No honeymoon has been planned with conflicting work schedules. Both must go back to work the very next day after the wedding.

But something has upset Abby while riding the bus to work that morning. She frantically pulls the cord for the driver to stop. In her haste to escape the confines of the bus, once on the curb, she steps right in front of the bus as it pulls away. Was it intentional or something else altogether?

Joyce Carol Oates has opened a sort of Pandora's Box in this one. The more we lift the lid, the more we shudder to find out what's inside. Oates creates a parallel storyline of present and past lining it with Abby's struggles after the bus accident and a glimpse into the lives of her unsettling parents, Nicola and Lew.

Be warned that Oates adds some pretty heavy-duty ingredients in The Pursuit. It's people behaving badly, really badly. With sparks of PTSD, verbal and physical abuse, and palpitating hearts, Oates sets up a highly unusual arc of circumstances here. I dare you not to speed through this compact little gem of 224 pages of life cruising through Bizarroville. Just don't get pulled over until you reach the end of the road, Folks. Whew!

I received a copy of The Pursuit through NetGalley for an honest review. My thanks to The Mysterious Press and to Joyce Carol Oates for the opportunity.

This is another great read from Joyce Carol Oates. This suspenseful story has three main characters- mother, daughter, and father. Because it is told from all three perspectives, you don’t really know where the truth lies so you need to be comfortable with all the loose ends not being tied. Enjoy the story for the story. At the end, though, I was really hoping for more. In fact, when I could turn no more pages, I thought it was a mistake. I quickly tried to confirm that there was no more. And not because it was a bad ending- just because I wanted the story to go on!

Please note that I received an advanced copy of this book by the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

A gripping story for the right reader. I count myself a JCO fan, but I have had too many stories of violence against women in my reading pile as of late. So my timing was off with this one, but others will certainly appreciate the tension and suspense JCO creates in this shirt, but powerful novel.

'Here is the mistake: to have given into happiness. She will be punished now.'

Abby had hoped that becoming Mrs. Willem Zengler could save her, the damned, the cursed. Is it possible to cup happiness in both hands and drink from it? When she closes her eyes to sleep, it is always there, the bones, the horror. Love can’t chase that away, nor could protection. It always finds her, and the past won’t let her go. As a new bride she steps into traffic, maybe she was sleepwalking? She seemed so agitated! Witnesses saw something wasn’t right, her face one of horror, fear but of what? As if she were being chased.

Her husband Willem doesn’t understand, he must remain at her bedside in the ICU. What will he say if she wakes up? What if she strode into traffic by choice? What does any of this mean? He is gut sick, worse, he keeps playing back their meeting in his mind. The possibility that she has lied about her life disturbs him. This disorientation, it’s happened before, hasn’t it? He remembers too the restlessness, the whimpering cries while she was asleep, dreaming. He vowed to protect her, that is his role as her husband, but now as she lies comatose, the proof is he has failed her.

What of that parent-less past doesn’t he know? She doesn’t want to tell, she doesn’t want him to pursue her fears, her dream, her terror. She is both the victim and the perpetrator, in her memory. She carries an entourage of skeletons, she was so young, but it’s her fault, isn’t it? In order to be free, she must stop running from the nightmare. It is a ruined house, her entire childhood, a ruined house. She doesn’t want to be that orphan again with a tragic past, a past that is rotting somewhere, still undiscovered either in her mind or the tall grass, or both. What would Willem think?

She has been trying to keep herself together, to be the right sort of woman, but her happiness as a newlywed is blurring, the poison of her past is bleeding through and there isn’t an escape, not even in a handsome, tall husband. There is no shelter, no escape from the pursuit.

She is not who she professes to be, she is not fully present, and she can’t fake it anymore. Life always circles back, the past comes back for you, how like a ring.

This is a fairly short novel considering the many books I have devoted my days to reading by Oates. She has an intuition about the things we don’t talk about or present to the world, and writes about them like no other, so I am always delighted to read anything she puts to paper. This is a fast read, and you are in the confusion, the terror of Abby’s mind before the “accident” and tormented by the ghosts of her past as if you are in her shoes. It’s very much about the effects of trauma. How unfair, the things we’re forced to carry behind us, like a rotting corpse. Some childhoods aren’t about frolicking in the fields chasing butterflies, at least not in Oates world. Here children are left with blood on their hands.

Publication Date: October 11, 2019

Grove Atlantic

Mysterious Press

Abby Hayman has not had an easy life. When her parents disappeared when she was 5 years old, she went to live with an aunt, who had troubles of her own. Abby grew up confused by her memories of things she had been too young to understand. She has a recurring dream of walking in a field of skeletons, which she finds completely terrorizing. She’s 20 years old now and has just married William Zengler, a devout Christian who is madly in love with her. That makes it all the more difficult to understand why she steps out into traffic the day after her wedding when she was so happy to be William’s bride. Was it an accident or a suicide attempt?

The first two pages of this book proves, once again, that Joyce Carol Oates is a master at her craft. Those pages were so chilling and pulled me right into this compelling, heartbreaking tale. This is a very intense, dark story with some extremely brutal moments. It’s more of a novella at only 144 pages, but Ms. Oates knows how to make every word count. It punches your heart with a powerful emotional wallop. Ms. Oates writes compassionately about the long term effects of war on soldiers and the devastating effect of violence on a family. This one is going to haunt me for a long time to come.

Most highly recommended.

A creepy book for the Fall/Halloween season. It’s a quick read so grab your drink and get ready to be on the edge of your seat. I almost wished it was longer!

One reviewer on GoodReads called JCO "the finest living storyteller" and I couldn't agree more. Her range of topics and ability to tap into the atmosphere each needs is uncanny. In this small novel, she address PTSD, spousal abuse, and the sometimes blind eye by authorities. No word is wasted as she recounts the horrifying consequences PTSD can have on a spouse and child. And no genre is safe from the talented pen of Ms. Oates!

Thanks to Mysterious Press and NetGalley for the ARC to read and review.

This book of family terror, Pursuit by Joyce Carol Oates, is so sad and sometimes so gruesome. Abby and Willem, are married, they are both very young and Willem is devotedly in love with Abby. I'm not so sure Abby loves Willem or he is the saviour to her horrible life. The day after the small and simple wedding, Abby gets off a bus, earlier then her usual stop, and then walks to her stop and steps out in front of the bus. In the hospital Willem is devastated and worried to lose Abby, he does not lose Abby but she does confess her horribly sickening childhood, one that she has never told anyone, but confesses what she know to Willem. They set out on a short journey to find some answers to her terrible nightmares and all that she does not know. Ms. Oates does know how tell this story which is so horrifying, with a bit of compassion swirled in. Thank you #NetGalley #Pursuit #MysteriousPress

Joyce Carol Oates brings her newest book to readers that really packs a punch. Though short in length, the subject matter delivers a deep and lasting impact.

Abby, a newlywed of less than 24 hours, is in a serious accident that forces her to come to terms with a haunting past that may have contributed to the accident. Her husband, Willem, knows almost nothing of Abby’s past, but as she recovers she begins to confide in Willem about her recurring nightmare and something she thinks she saw as a child.

What is revealed is a deeply disturbing story of domestic violence. I have to confess, I had to skim over some of the details because the scene described in the story is truly horrifying. Any readers sensitive to domestic violence need to be aware that this is not a book that glosses over what can happen in a marriage when one partner is mentally unstable.

The story is told through the eyes of multiple narrators and I was never quite sure which one to believe. I liked the ending and the validation for Abby and the trust that grew between the newly married couple as a result.

Oates is a superb writer and I was mesmerized by the story. Just note, this one is not for the faint of heart.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Grove Atlantic Mysterious Press for allowing me to read an advance copy and give my honest review.