Critics' Opinion:
Readers' rating:
Published Jun 2022
240 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
Richly emotive and darkly captivating, with elements of Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" and the imaginative depth of Margaret Atwood, Elsewhere by Alexis Schaitkin conjures a community in which girls become wives, wives become mothers and some of them, quite simply, disappear.
Vera grows up in a small town, removed and isolated, pressed up against the mountains, cloud-covered and damp year-round. This town, fiercely protective, brutal and unforgiving in its adherence to tradition, faces a singular affliction: some mothers vanish, disappearing into the clouds. It is the exquisite pain and intrinsic beauty of their lives; it sets them apart from people elsewhere and gives them meaning.
Vera, a young girl when her own mother went, is on the cusp of adulthood herself. As her peers begin to marry and become mothers, they speculate about who might be the first to go, each wondering about her own fate. Reveling in their gossip, they witness each other in motherhood, waiting for signs: this one devotes herself to her child too much, this one not enough―that must surely draw the affliction's gaze. When motherhood comes for Vera, she is faced with the question: will she be able to stay and mother her beloved child, or will she disappear?
Provocative and hypnotic, Alexis Schaitkin's Elsewhere is at once a spellbinding revelation and a rumination on the mysterious task of motherhood and all the ways in which a woman can lose herself to it; the self-monitoring and judgment, the doubts and unknowns, and the legacy she leaves behind.
"Schaitkin returns with the profound story of a remote mountain village defined by the routine disappearances of mothers...Schaitkin gives the goings-on great substance by digging into the complicated feelings brought on by motherhood and the judgments from others, all the while delineating the mothers' utter joy, frustrations, and love for their children. This is a standout." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Schaitkin has written a compelling, poetic, and chilling novel that examines fate and fear." - Booklist (starred review)
"A simply stunning work of speculative fiction. The prose is as magical as the haunting world Schaitkin creates; the story is as captivating as the prose; the characters, the imagery—flawless...Schaitkin's sophomore novel channels early Margaret Atwood, a magical, otherworldly story certain to be on plenty of 2022 'best of' lists." - Library Journal (starred review)
"In a complete departure from her debut, Saint X (2020), Schaitkin's sophomore novel is a fabulist narrative with Shirley Jackson overtones and Margaret Atwood...An elaborately imagined yet not quite satisfying fable of loss and isolation." - Kirkus Reviews
"Schaitkin's writing is transcendent. Elsewhere takes the visceral experience of motherhood―all its private joys, invisible fears, personal losses, and vague sensations of being judged―and turns it inside out, weaving each element into a dark fairy tale that is wise, gorgeous, and deeply moving." - Ali Benjamin, author of The Smash-Up
"Elsewhere is among my favorite novels of the last decade. There's an eerie, gorgeous magic to Schaitkin's vision that's related to the magic of Kazuo Ishiguro and Shirley Jackson but also entirely her own. I hadn't realized how much it would mean to me to witness an intelligence this fierce and singular, a capacity for feeling this deep, and a gift for language this extraordinary all trained on the subject of motherhood in all its wonder and strangeness." - Clare Beams, author of The Illness Lesson
This information about Elsewhere was first featured
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Alexis Schaitkin's debut novel, Saint X, was named a New York Times Notable Book of 2020 and was critically acclaimed by the Washington Post, Entertainment Weekly, People Magazine, and Good Morning America. It was recently picked up for a series adaptation by Hulu and has been translated into seven languages.
Her next novel, Elsewhere, was released by Celadon Books in June 2022. Her short stories have been anthologized in The Best American Short Stories and The Best American Nonrequired Reading. She received her MFA in fiction from the University of Virginia, where she was a Henry Hoyns Fellow.
She lives in the Berkshires with her husband and their two children.
Link to Alexis Schaitkin's Website
Name Pronunciation
Alexis Schaitkin: SHAY-kin
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