When a young woman leaves her family to join a secret off-the-grid community headed by an enigmatic leader, she discovers that belonging comes with a deadly cost, in this тАЬstunning debut,тАЭ (The New Yorker) тАЬperfect for fans of Philip RothтАЩs American Pastoral and the film Martha Marcy May MarleneтАЭ (Booklist, starred review).
At nineteen, Berie encounters a seductive and mysterious man at a bus station near her home in North Carolina. Shut off from the people around her, she finds herself compelled by his promise of a new life. He ferries her into a place of order and chaos: the Ash Family farm. There, she joins a community living off the fertile land of the mountains, bound together by high ideals and through relationships she canтАЩt untangle. BerieтАФnow renamed HarmonyтАФrenounces her old life and settles into her new one on the farm. She begins to make friends. And then they start to disappear.
тАЬAn excellent debut, Molly Dektar probes life in a cult with a masterful hand, excavating the troubled mind of a young woman,тАЭ (Publishers Weekly). The Ash Family explores what we will sacrifice in the search for happiness, and the beautiful and grotesque power of the human spirit as it seeks its ultimate place of belonging. тАЬA captivating and haunting taleтАЭ (New York Journal of Books).