“Exquisite and harrowing. . . . gorgeously written and deeply insightful.”
—The New York Times Book Review
A Best of 2019 Title from: Amazon • People • BuzzFeed • NPR • Real Simple • Kirkus • CBC • Library Journal • Slate • The Wall Street Journal • Washington Post • CoveyClub • Chicago Public Library
On a hot July night on Cape Cod when Adrienne was fourteen, her mother, Malabar, woke her at midnight with five simple words that would set the course of both of their lives for years to come: Ben Souther just kissed me.
Adrienne instantly became her mother’s confidante and helpmate, blossoming in the sudden light of her attention, and from then on, Malabar came to rely on her daughter to help orchestrate what would become an epic affair with her husband’s closest friend. The affair would have calamitous consequences for everyone involved, impacting Adrienne’s life in profound ways, driving her into a precarious marriage of her own, and then into a deep depression. Only years later will she find the strength to embrace her life—and her mother—on her own terms.
Wild Game is a brilliant, timeless memoir about how the people close to us can break our hearts simply because they have access to them, and the lies we tell in order to justify the choices we make. It’s a remarkable story of resilience, a reminder that we need not be the parents our parents were to us.
Out Now!
“Exquisite and harrowing.... [Wild Game] is so gorgeously written and deeply insightful, and with a line of narrative tension that never slacks, from the first page to the last, that it’s one you’ll likely read in a single, delicious sitting.”
“This electrifying, gorgeously written memoir will hold you captive until the last word.”
“Brodeur offers one of the most humane looks at a profoundly flawed mother that I have read, and the feats of empathy and generosity it must have taken to do so, given the damage her mother did to her psyche and life, are as impressive as Wild Game’s storytelling prowess.”
“Adrienne Brodeur’s breathless memoir starts off with a bang. . . . Every single turn of this memoir is gripping. . . . Brodeur’s descriptions of her mother read like a paramour waxing rhapsodic, the recollections of someone in inescapable thrall. . . . In Wild Game, Brodeur shows us that what defines our lives is choosing just how bound we want to be.”
“As a 14-year-old, Adrienne Brodeur became the confidante for her mother and the possessor of one epic secret: her mother’s affair with her husband’s best friend. It set in motion years of consequences, grief and family struggles retold intimately by Brodeur and layered with detail, excitement and heartbreak throughout years of Cape Cod summers.”
“Wild Game . . . follows Brodeur as she comes of age and begins to question how a parent could implicate her child in such a gnawing, damaging secret. Though the affair is captivating enough to read on its own, Brodeur’s reflections on the impact of our parents create the memoir’s center.”
“This electrifying, gorgeously written memoir will hold you captive until the last word.”
“Wild Game . . . [brings] readers closely into scenes with vivid sensual detail that paints the atmosphere with the adoring eyes of the enthralled daughter the author once was. . . . [What] makes this book especially novel-like is how close Brodeur remains to the mindset she was in at the time of the events unfolding. . . . Wild Game, for all its luscious prose and tantalizing elements, is ultimately about the slow and painful process of losing a mother. Malabar is still alive, if unwell, as of the book’s ending, but Brodeur is no longer the girl who felt that being chosen to carry secrets was the same thing as unconditional love.”
“A glittering, insightful page-turner of the worst-case scenario of mother-daughter boundary issues.”
“Brodeur is a deft memoirist, portraying Malabar as a woman traumatized by a violent parent and early tragedy. In this stunning tale of treachery—unsettling yet seductive—we are led through some of the darkest and most alluring corridors of the human heart.”
“Perhaps everyone has a memoir in them—but only some lives are instant and undeniable blockbusters. Adrienne Brodeur’s is one. . . . The miracle of Wild Game is that Brodeur’s writing is as incredible as her story. Brodeur captures the emotional gradations in a tense room as deftly as she establishes the sea salt air and elaborate dinners of her childhood. . . .[Wild Game] will undeniably be the book club pick of 2019.”
“Juicy and delicious. . . . Wild Game is an honest reckoning of a dishonest time, a loving but critical portrait of a woman who prioritized her own happiness above all else, and an insightful retrospective of the author’s complicity in an all-consuming lie. . . . [Brodeur] is a gifted writer, with a particular talent for narrative flow. The story never lets up, and you won’t want to put it down.”
“Wild Game might have just the right industry bona fides and credulity-defying premise to become this fall’s breakout title. . . . a genuine page-turner.”
“This graceful and heartbreaking memoir explores complicity, forgiveness, and complex familial relationships.”
“[A] vivid memoir. . . . [Brodeur] writes beautifully, even tenderly, as a mother herself, aware of repercussions, knowing how it all ended.”
“Adrienne Brodeur’s stunning memoir is the kind of true story that makes you wonder why we’d ever need fiction. It’s a beautifully written, totally engrossing story unlike any we’ve read before—and will surely be one of the most talked-about books of the year.”
“One of the fall’s buzziest memoirs . . . it’s the kind of juicy what-is-happening memoir that just begs to be made into a movie. Luckily for us, the film rights have already been sold.”
“Highly anticipated. . . . Adrienne Brodeur’s twisted mother-daughter story could be the next big memoir.”
“Page-turning . . . reads like heady beach fiction. . . . This layered narrative of deceit, denial, and disillusionment is a surefire bestseller.”
“Fast-paced and evocative . . . Brodeur’s writing is passionate, sensual, and often deceptively simple. She culls gorgeous details of Cape Cod . . . to make the setting as much a character in this drama as the humans inhabiting it. . . . Brodeur shows herself a worthy descendant of her family of writers.”
“Engrossing . . . . An absorbing story of secrets, love, and family.”
“A memoir about a charismatic mother who embroiled her daughter in a dramatic affair. . . . a candid, deftly crafted narrative . . . A vivid chronicle of a daughter’s struggle to find herself.”
“Brodeur’s story explores the bond between mother and daughter and the ripple effect a family secret can have when passed among generations. Highly recommended.”
“Wild Game is Brodeur’s unbelievable memoir of the toll this secret took on her life, and believe me—if you don’t read this one, you will be out of the loop.”
“Here is a book you won’t want to put down for anything. Not since The Glass Castle has a memoir managed to convey such a complex family bond, in which love, devotion, and corrosive secrets are inextricably linked. Gorgeous, addictive, unflinching, Wild Game is a must-read.”
and Saints for All Occasions
“Entirely unique and utterly enthralling, Wild Game examines the ardor of a daughter’s love, caught up in the relentless needs of her mother. In this courageous act of radical self-reflection and truth-telling, Brodeur untangles karmic threads that bind families together across the generations.”
“Wild Game tells an extraordinary family story, but this riveting memoir will touch all mothers and daughters. Adrienne Brodeur explores with compassionate clarity the intense bonds of love and need that create a family; and the destruction that can ensue. This is a beautiful book.”
“It’s a rare memoir that reads like a thriller, but Adrienne Brodeur’s Wild Game manages to do just that. Beautifully written and harrowing, the book left me breathless.”
“A searing, indelible memoir of an extraordinary mother and her equally extraordinary daughter. Among Adrienne Brodeur’s many achievements in Wild Game—beautiful prose, a riveting story, elegantly told—what I found most moving is the love threaded through every page of this unforgettable book.”
“Adrienne Brodeur has had decades to consider her glamorous, aspiring, and deeply manipulative mother, along with her complex influence on her life. She appears to have used each day to explore and perfectly distill this legacy of sex, lies, and love into a memoir that is intimate, emotionally gripping, exquisitely shaped. Brodeur’s search for honesty is heroic and graceful; her hard-earned understanding animates this quietly shattering book about how lies passed by parents embed themselves into their children’s hearts.”