• Booklist Reviews : Booklist Reviews 2019 May #1
  *Starred Review* Baker's first novel since A Country Road, a Tree (2016) revolves around the terrifying experience of a professor caught up in a student's dangerous obsession. Three years after a harrowing assault in London leaves the unnamed narrator traumatized, she accepts a position teaching writing at a university deep in the English countryside. Her husband decides to keep his city job and commute to see her and their young son on weekends. At first, she's entranced with the small town, the large house she's renting, and her charming, welcoming colleagues. Her six graduate students appear to be talented and unique, but she can't help but be unsettled by the attention paid her by one of them, Nicholas, a seemingly deeply sensitive young man writing a novel about his dead girlfriend. When their relationship takes a dark turn after a party, the narrator finds herself caught up in a nightmare that threatens her sense of safety, her career, and even her life. With an unflinching eye, Baker deftly explores the pressure, judgment, and dangers women are subjected to on a daily basis simply because they are female. Her brilliant novel is a scathing indictment of the many ways society excoriates women while excusing violent men. A must read. Copyright 2019 Booklist Reviews.

JO BAKER was born in Lancashire and educated at Oxford University and Queen's University Belfast. She is the author of the best-selling novel Longbourn, as well as A Country Road, A Tree; The Undertow; The Telling; The Mermaid's Child; and Offcomer. She lives in Lancaster, England.