I Will Leave You Never

A Novel

by Ann Putnam

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Pub Date May 09 2023 | Archive Date Apr 27 2023

She Writes Press

Literary Fiction | Women's Fiction

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Description

In the middle of a perilous drought in the Northwest, an arsonist begins setting fires all around. It gives Zoe Penney nightmares about her home—seated right next to tinder-dry woods—rising up in explosions of fire, as well as haunting dreams of a little boy deep in the forest.

Winter brings the longed-for rains but also a cancer diagnosis for Zoe’s husband, Jay, which plunges the family into disbelief and fear. The children lean in close to their parents, can’t stop touching them. As Jay’s treatment begins, nature lets loose with strange and startling encounters, while a shadowy figure hovers about the corners of the house.

First, Zoe’s fear turns to anger: How can I love you if I am to lose you? How can I live in joy when the sky is falling? But she gradually learns that it’s possible to love anything, even terrible things—if you can love them for what they are teaching you.

Advance Praise

“Ann Putnam’s glorious I Will Leave You Never is a story of threat and survival and the ties of love that bind us to one another. This novel resonates with the fragile and yet persistent threads of our living, threads that will vibrate inside you for a long time to come.”

—Lee Martin, author of Pulitzer finalist The Bright Forever

“Ann Putnam is the kind of extraordinary writer who captures heartbreak and longing with such startling precision and in such beautiful prose that you cannot help but be moved. Zoe and Jay, this family, will live in my memory for years to come.”

—Dolen Perkins Valdez, New York Times best-selling author of Wench, Balm and Take My Hand

“Ann Putnam’s I Will Leave You Never is a heartbreaking, gracefully rendered story of the quiet moments between and around the devastating ones and of the beautiful inner workings of the heart and minds battling their way along life’s toughest roads.”

—Laurie Frankel, New York Times best-selling author of This is How It Always Is and One Two Three

“Ann Putnam’s ironically titled I Will Leave You Never is a novel full of leave-takings that even Zoe—the appointed family worrier—could not anticipate over the course of a year that will strain but not break the bonds of her loving family.”

—Ladette Randolph, editor-in-chief of Ploughshares and author of Pushcart Prize winner Private Way

“Exquisitely written, this luminous novel takes you to the deep heart of a marriage. Threatened by illness and arson, a family with three children and too many puppies ultimately finds the strength to go forward with wit and insight.”

—Beverly Conner, author of Where Light is a Place, Falling From Grace

“Ominous and original, Ann Putnam’s novel is characteristically lyrical and precise. It is at its heart a love story, where characters facing loss uncover the generative quality of love.”

—Beth Kalikoff, author of Dying for a Blue Plate Special

“It’s no surprise that Ann Putnam’s most recent novel, I Will Leave You Never, features compelling characters in Zoe and Jay (among others) and lush, vivid writing. Fans of her short stories and her novel Cuban Quartermoon will, like me, rejoice that a new novel has appeared.”

—Hans Ostrom, author of Honoring Juanita