• Booklist Reviews : Booklist Reviews 2013 June #1
  How does a marriage fall apart? Hill's first novel mines the lives of her characters in an attempt to answer this question. Beginning at the end of Cassandra and Abe's relationship, the story opens with the two on an afternoon sailing trip with their teenage daughter, Elizabeth. Suddenly, when Abe discovers that Cassandra has been unfaithful, the marriage implodes; Abe erupts in a fit of anger and jumps ship, leaving mother and daughter to navigate their way through San Francisco Bay without him. The novel then oscillates between the beginning of the couple's relationship and forward to the death of Elizabeth's father in Maryland, exploring moments throughout the pair's lives that seem both momentous and inconsequential. Hill handles the intimacy of family ties with care and tenderness. Readers who enjoyed Jonathan Franzen's Freedom (2010) will relate as Hill's characters similarly and systematically unravel from each other. Copyright 2013 Booklist Reviews.

Katherine Hill is a graduate of Yale University and holds an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars. Her writing has been published by AGNI, The Believer, Bookforum, Colorado Review, The Common, n+1, and the San Francisco Chronicle. She is an assistant editor at Barrelhouse,and lives with her husband in Princeton, New Jersey.