The End of Everything: A Novel

The End of Everything

A Novel

By Megan Abbott
(Reagan Arthur Books, Google eBook, Gu46nBO7OCMC)

Publication Date: July 2011

Other Editions of This Title: Hardcover, Paperback, Paperback, Paperback, Audio Cassette, Compact Disc, Compact Disc, MP3 CD

Categories: Thrillers, Suspense, Psychological, Historical - General

Selected by Indie Booksellers for the August 2011 Indie Next List

“Innocence ends abruptly for 13-year-old Lizzie and Evie. As bone-deep best friends and neighbors, Lizzie thought there were no secrets between them. She sees Evie's family as perfect, especially her ideal, dazzling dad. But can we ever truly know one another? Evie disappears, and as the town frantically searches for the young girl, Lizzie becomes the focus of attention. She learns that perhaps she did not know her friend quite so well and perfection is an elusive state. Life can be confusing for 13-year-old girls, their bodies just awakening, their emotions not quite ready to be adult. Abbot perfectly captures the tragedy of vulnerability.”

-- Deon Stonehouse, Sunriver Books, Sunriver, OR

Description

Thirteen-year old Lizzie Hood and her next door neighbor Evie Verver are inseparable. They are best friends who swap bathing suits and field-hockey sticks, and share everything that's happened to them. Together they live in the shadow of Evie's glamorous older sister Dusty, who provides a window on the exotic, intoxicating possibilities of their own teenage horizons. To Lizzie, the Verver household, presided over by Evie's big-hearted father, is the world's most perfect place.

And then, one afternoon, Evie disappears. The only clue: a maroon sedan Lizzie spotted driving past the two girls earlier in the day. As a rabid, giddy panic spreads through the Midwestern suburban community, everyone looks to Lizzie for answers. Was Evie unhappy, troubled, upset? Had she mentioned being followed? Would she have gotten into the car of a stranger?

Lizzie takes up her own furtive pursuit of the truth, prowling nights through backyards, peering through windows, pushing herself to the dark center of Evie's world. Haunted by dreams of her lost friend and titillated by her own new power at the center of the disappearance, Lizzie uncovers secrets and lies that make her wonder if she knew her best friend at all.

About the Author

Megan Abbott is the Edgar-award winning author of four crime novels. She has taught literature, writing, and film at New York University, the New School and the State University of New York at Oswego. She received her Ph.D. in English and American literature from New York University in 2000. She lives in New York City.

Praise For The End of Everything…

"Stirring...[a] storytelling feat."
-New York Times

"A haunting story...evoke[s] the furtive blossoming of adolescent sexuality...that lies beneath the ice cream shops and sprinklered lawns of '80s suburbia."
-Entertainment Weekly

"Fans of Tana French and Kate Atkinson will welcome Abbott's haunting psychological thriller ... Abbott expertly captures the nuances of lost innocence and childhood friendships, without ever losing an undercurrent of menace."
-Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)

"A mesmerizing psychological thriller and a freshly imagined coming-of-age story, will draw comparisons to The Lovely Bones."
-Los Angeles Times

"THE END OF EVERYTHING will haunt you as only a modern-day Lolita can."
-Huffington Post

"The writing is anything but typical, as Abbott's inventive use of language to build imagery reads more like poetry than prose."
-Boston Globe

"A sensitive, unconventional tale about the infinitely complex mystery of sexual awakening that lingers in the mind long after the book is finished."
-The Guardian (UK)

"THE END OF EVERYTHING is Abbott's most refined and rapturous offering yet."
-Los Angeles Review of Books

"An accomplished psychological thriller... a highly skilful novel, taut, addictive, full of stuff to keep you hungrily reading."
-Sunday Times of London

- More Indie Next Lists -

	1Q84 Haruki Murakami Knopf
	The Marriage Plot Jeffrey Eugenides Farrar, Straus, and Giroux
	The Sense of an Ending Julian Barnes Knopf
	Death Comes to Pemberley PD James Knopf