Marking the arrival of a major new voice in literary suspense, A Small Indiscretion is the riveting story of a harrowing coming-of-age, a marriage under siege, and a mother who must excavate the truth. Fans of Everything I Never Told You and The Girl on the Train will devour this O. Henry Prize winner’s hypnotic debut about how one woman’s youthful obsession hijacks her family’s happiness.
At nineteen, Annie Black deserts her childhood home in L.A. for a London winter of drinking with abandon and looking for love in exactly the wrong places. Twenty years later, she has put her libertine past behind her and is a happily married mother of three settled in San Francisco. Then one June morning, a photograph arrives mysteriously in her mailbox, an old obsession is awakened, and Annie’s life begins its spectacular unraveling.
Past and present disastrously collide when Annie returns to London seeking answers. Her marriage falters, her lighting store floods, and her son, Robbie, climbs into a car for a night-time ride that nearly costs him his life. Now Annie must fight to save her family by untangling the mysteries of her past, and making amends—not only for the fateful mistakes of the summer, but for those of that distant winter in Europe that drew an invisible map of her family’s future.
Brilliantly paced, compulsively readable, and written in the lyrical, insightful prose that won Jan Ellison an O. Henry Prize for her first published story, A Small Indiscretion is the story of a woman’s reckoning with a past that won’t stay buried, and a profound commentary on denial, forgiveness, and love—the kind that damages, and the kind that redeems.
Check out the author's bio HERE.
Read a Q&A with the author HERE.
A Small Indiscretion: A Novel (a short audible excerpt)
Praise for the book:
“An emotional thriller . . . Connoisseurs of domestic suspense will finish this book in a few breathless sittings.”~Kirkus Reviews
“Are those wild college days ever really behind you? Happily married Annie finds out.” ~Cosmopolitan
“[A] cleverly constructed debut . . . a deftly crafted, absorbing novel that peels back the layers of Annie’s character as it reveals the secrets of her past and present.” ~Booklist
“An engrossing, believable, gracefully written family drama that reveals our past’s bare-knuckle grip on our present.” ~Emma Donoghue, author of Room
“A stunning debut by Jan Ellison . . . Like the photograph that arrives in the mail and sets in motion the plot of this gorgeous novel, A Small Indiscretion reminds us of the intensity of youthful desire and of the fragile nature of a marriage built on secrecy.” ~Ann Packer, author of The Dive from Clausen’s Pier
“A Small Indiscretion is that rare thing—a literary page turner written with great warmth and humanity, which pulls the reader in emotionally without a hint of sentimentality.”—Alice LaPlante, author of Turn of Mind
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