Bad Animals A Novel

Sarah Braunstein

eBook - 2024

"[A] sharp-witted, ravishing novel." —Claire Luchette, New York Times Book Review A sexy, propulsive novel that confronts the limits of empathy and the perils of appropriation through the eyes of a disgraced small-town librarian. Now that her brilliant botanist daughter is off at college, buttoned-up Maeve Cosgrove loves her job at a quiet Maine public library more than anything. But when a teenager accuses Maeve—Maeve!—of spying on her romantic escapades in the mezzanine bathroom, she winds up laid off and humiliated. Stuck at home in a tailspin, Maeve cares for the mysterious plants in her daughter's greenhouse while obsessing over the clearly troubled girl at the source of the rumor. She hopes to have a powerful all...y in her attempts to clear her name: her favorite author, Harrison Riddles, who has finally responded to her adoring letters and accepted an invitation to speak at the library. Riddles, meanwhile, arrives... more