A "fearless, penetrating debut" (Tish Cohen, author of Town House) about a troubled artist who has painted herself into a corner

After surviving a turbulent childhood, Mara Foster has finally gained independence and success as a painter. Now in her late twenties, she lives alone, still burdened by a troubled past involving a teenaged affair with an older man and the tragic loss of her college boyfriend. But when Mara meets Hugo, the walls she has built around herself begin to crumble. Despite herself, she starts to fall in love and realizes she must either confront her dark secrets or be consumed by them. And either way, she risks losing Hugo and her second chance at happiness.

Written in spare, crisp prose and marked by wry humor, Falling Under is a gripping contemporary urban tale of human weakness, friendship, and hard-earned redemption.

"Playwright Young-Ullman's first novel is a familiar story about a young woman balancing love and career, told with some artsy flourishes and a touch of dark wit. Painter Mara Foster avoids leaving her house for fear of gruesome accidents, wears only black and gray, and prefers one-night-stands to relationships. Rooted in her parents' ugly divorce and a past lover's suicide (indicated through oblique references), Mara's dark moods and self-doubt make her an edgy, self-conscious narrator, but her agoraphobia is often dispensed with when it's less than convenient to the narrative. Childhood flashbacks, written in the second person, provide more pretension than psychological insight. Mara's relationships with her best friend, Bernadette, and her penitent father provide the novel its most honest moments, but the men romantically complicating Mara's life are so broadly drawn as to be interchangeable. When Younge-Ullman's time-shifting narrative finally gives up the whole story of Mara's past, the catharsis doesn't adequately address the building conflicts, leading to a disappointing, deliberately ambiguous ending." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

A fearless, penetrating debut (Tish Cohen, author of "Town House") about a troubled artist who has painted herself into a corner, "Falling Under" is a gripping urban tale of human weakness, friendship, and hard-earned redemption.

Danielle Younge-Ullman is a novelist, playwright, and actor from Toronto, Canada. Her one-act play, 7 Acts of Intercourse, debuted at Toronto's SummerWorks festival in 2005. This is her first novel.