Bug Hollow A novel

The Samuelson family stumbles through the extremes of love and loss in the intriguing if undercooked sixth novel from Huneven (Search). It begins in 1970s Northern California, when Ellis, a recent high school graduate, goes missing. He eventually returns, having taken a road trip with friends, but the episode's painful impact on his family proves to be a prelude for later grief. After Ellis accidentally drowns during his first semester at college, the tragedy serves as a catalyst for the other characters' life-altering decisions. Julia, Ellis's pregnant girlfriend, struggles to decide whether to take the pregnancy to term before arranging to have Ellis's parents adopt the baby, named Eva. Ellis's mother, Sybil, an elementary school teacher, drinks heavily and puts her work before her two younger daughters, overachieving Katie and artistic Sally, while their father, an architect, struggles to find a way forward. Later sections focus on the sisters in adulthood, as Katie leaves home to become a doctor while Sally helps raise Eva, now a young woman who tries to make sense of her family. Huneven succeeds at sketching the ways a family is shaped by trauma, but she maintains a fuzzy distance from the characters while shuttling through time, as if flipping through a yellowed photo album. This one leaves readers wanting more. Agent: Brettne Bloom, Book Group. (June)

After a tragedy, the fortunes of a California family unfold in unexpected ways. It's the mid-1970s when the curtain rises on architect Phil Samuelson, his schoolteacher wife, Sibyl, and their three children, Ellis, Katie, and Sally. Ellis, who will turn 18 that summer before college, heads off with a couple of friends for a week-long road trip but does not return on schedule, sending his parents only a few brief letters assuring them that he's fine and begging them not to track him down. As it turns out, Ellis dies so early in the book it seems no spoiler to say it, and his death will be quickly followed by another shock: He left behind a pregnant girlfriend. With a structure reminiscent of Ann Patchett'sCommonwealth (2016), Huneven moves among her characters and over the next four decades to set up and spring all the surprises she has in store, occasionally leaving California to trace developments in spots as far-flung as Saudi Arabia and Oaxaca, and eventually requiring the services of 23andMe and the legalization of same-sex marriage to make all the many pieces fall into place. As someone aptly describes the central couple, "Oh, Phil's lovely. His wife, though, is a prickly thing. But isn't that always the case: the easygoing marry the prickles because who else would have them?" Yes, Phil is easier to love than Sibyl, and daughter Sally is quite a bit more appealing than her older sister, Katie, but Huneven is good at unlikable characters, making them fully three-dimensional while stopping far short of sappy redemption. Another of her signature elements, alcoholism, is in the mix as well, appearing via a deep green tumbler of "Hawaiian Punch" clutched in the hand of a major character and two cases of beer drunk daily by a pair of minor ones, retired civil servants and would-be swingers who run a donut shop in the middle of nowhere. Gotta love that. A deeply satisfying novel; Huneven's best work to date. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.