Ducks Newburyport

Ducks, Newburyport resembles a Dewey Decimal card catalog dedicated to post-9/11 Americana being rifled through at warp speed or the collected stories of Diane Williams algorithmically rewritten with a Great Lakes accent. Superlatives fall short, especially when we're talking about a book that flouts the fusty conventions of the canon so wildly. Simply put, this mile-a-moment internal monologue is indisputably a landmark work of genius-level ingenuity and derring-do. More importantly, Ellmann is writing something so free from the standards of well-trodden terms like "landmark" and "genius" that they begin to lose all meaning whatsoever. And thank heavens for that. Recommended By Justin W., Powells.com

A form-breaking torrent of consciousness, narrated by an Ohio mother besieged by MAGA hats and mountain lions.

Peeling apple after apple for the tartes tatin she bakes for local restaurants, an Ohio mother wonders how to exist in a world of distraction and fake facts, besieged by a tweet-happy president and trigger-happy neighbors, and all of them oblivious to what Dupont has dumped into the rivers and what’s happening at the factory farm down the interstate—not to mention what was done to the land’s first inhabitants. A torrent of consciousness, narrated in a single sentence by a woman whose wandering thoughts are as comfortably familiar as they are heart-rending in their honesty, Ducks, Newburyport is a fearless indictment of our contemporary moment.

“A wildly ambitious and righteously angry portrait of contemporary America.”  The Observer

“Ulysses has nothing on this… Once you get going, you’ll be too absorbed to stop.” Cosmopolitan

"Far more than the typical examination of contemporary domestic life, Ducks, Newburyport is a poetic observation and haunting account of what it’s like to be a woman in Trump’s America and the messiness of everyday existence. A rare mix of witty and visceral, Ellmann is an effortlessly gifted writer that deserves all of our attention. It would take me at least 700 pages to detail how brilliant this book is." Cristina Rodriguez, Deep Vellum Books

A contemporary Molly Bloom soliloquy, a paginated lioness, a corrective, a challenge, a Moby-Dick of the kitchen…In 2019's most ambitious novel Ellmann puts us in the mind of one of literature's most neglected characters; an average woman and mother doing her best in a world that respects neither women nor mothers. Rambunctiously political, tenderly personal, and profoundly humanist, Ellmann's simple respect for her protagonist's thoughts, feelings, faults, & successes is revolutionary. And on top of everything else in this towering achievement of a novel, you'll find yourself desperately rooting for a mountain lion." Josh Cook, Porter Square Books

"...as deep and broad and beautiful and American as the Grand Canyon. Because this torrent spills from the mind of one ordinary woman (an Ohioan, a wife, a mom, a baker of pies), because she's hilarious, because her doubts and deprecations, her fondnesses and fears, are so mundane and relatable, because she exists as one of the truest-to-life fictional characters you could ever hope to meet, this book probably won't get the credit it deserves, credit for originality, insight, and literary excellence. Which is a shame, because Ducks, Newburyport is a domestic national epic to set beside Moby-Dick, a corrosive comic cultural indictment to compare with William Gaddis's National Book Award-winning J R. Read it and weep from laughter and righteous anger." James Crossley, Madison Books

A PUBLISHERS WEEKLY BIG BOOK OF WINTER INSTITUTE 14

A 2019 HERALD SCOTLAND BOOK TO WATCH FOR

AN OBSERVER 2019 FICTION PICK

Coming September 2019

Baking a multitude of tartes tatins for local restaurants, an Ohio housewife contemplates her four kids, husband, cats and chickens. Also, America's ignoble past, and her own regrets. She is surrounded by dead lakes, fake facts, Open Carry maniacs, and oodles of online advice about survivalism, veil toss duties, and how to be more like Jane Fonda. But what do you do when you keep stepping on your son's toy tractors, your life depends on stolen land and broken treaties, and nobody helps you when you get a flat tire on the interstate, not even the Abominable Snowman? When are you allowed to start swearing? With a torrent of consciousness and an intoxicating coziness, Ducks, Newburyport lays out a whole world for you to tramp around in, by turns frightening and funny. A heart-rending indictment of America's barbarity, and a lament for the way we are blundering into environmental disaster, this book is both heresy--and a revolution in the novel.

SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2019 BOOKER PRIZE Baking a multitude of tartes tatins for local restaurants, an Ohio housewife contemplates her four kids, husband, cats and chickens. Also, America's ignoble past, and her own regrets. She is surrounded by dead lakes, fake facts, Open Carry maniacs, and oodles of online advice about survivalism, veil toss duties, and how to be more like Jane Fonda. But what do you do when you keep stepping on your son's toy tractors, your life depends on stolen land and broken treaties, and nobody helps you when you get a flat tire on the interstate, not even the Abominable Snowman? When are you allowed to start swearing? With a torrent of consciousness and an intoxicating coziness, Ducks, Newburyport lays out a whole world for you to tramp around in, by turns frightening and funny. A heart-rending indictment of America's barbarity, and a lament for the way we are blundering into environmental disaster, this book is both heresy--and a revolution in the novel.

SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2019 BOOKER PRIZE SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2019 GOLDSMITHS PRIZE NOMINATED FOR THE 2020 ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE IN FICTION Baking a multitude of tartes tatins for local restaurants, an Ohio housewife contemplates her four kids, husband, cats and chickens. Also, America's ignoble past, and her own regrets. She is surrounded by dead lakes, fake facts, Open Carry maniacs, and oodles of online advice about survivalism, veil toss duties, and how to be more like Jane Fonda. But what do you do when you keep stepping on your son's toy tractors, your life depends on stolen land and broken treaties, and nobody helps you when you get a flat tire on the interstate, not even the Abominable Snowman? When are you allowed to start swearing? With a torrent of consciousness and an intoxicating coziness, Ducks, Newburyport lays out a whole world for you to tramp around in, by turns frightening and funny. A heart-rending indictment of America's barbarity, and a lament for the way we are blundering into environmental disaster, this book is both heresy--and a revolution in the novel.

WINNER OF THE 2019 GOLDSMITHS PRIZE - SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2019 BOOKER PRIZE - A NEW YORKER BEST BOOK OF 2019 - A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF 2019 - A TIME MUST-READ BOOK OF 2019

"This book has its face pressed up against the pane of the present; its form mimics the way our minds move now toggling between tabs, between the needs of small children and aging parents, between news of ecological collapse and school shootings while somehow remembering to pay taxes and fold the laundry."--Parul Sehgal, New York Times

Baking a multitude of tartes tatins for local restaurants, an Ohio housewife contemplates her four kids, husband, cats and chickens. Also, America's ignoble past, and her own regrets. She is surrounded by dead lakes, fake facts, Open Carry maniacs, and oodles of online advice about survivalism, veil toss duties, and how to be more like Jane Fonda. But what do you do when you keep stepping on your son's toy tractors, your life depends on stolen land and broken treaties, and nobody helps you when you get a flat tire on the interstate, not even the Abominable Snowman? When are you allowed to start swearing?

With a torrent of consciousness and an intoxicating coziness, Ducks, Newburyport lays out a whole world for you to tramp around in, by turns frightening and funny. A heart-rending indictment of America's barbarity, and a lament for the way we are blundering into environmental disaster, this book is both heresy―and a revolution in the novel.

Lucy Ellmann’s first novel, Sweet Desserts, won the Guardian Fiction Prize. It was followed by Varying Degrees of Hopelessness, Man or Mango?, A Lament, Dot in the Universe, Doctors & Nurses, Mimi. Her short stories have appeared in magazines, newspapers and anthologies, and she has written for the New York Times, Washington Post, Guardian, Independent, Independent on Sunday, Times Literary Supplement, Telegraph, New Statesman and Society, Spectator, Herald, Scottish Review of Books, Time Out (London), Art Monthly, Thirsty Books, Bookforum, Aeon, The Evergreen, and The Baffler. A screenplay, The Spy Who Caught a Cold, was filmed and broadcast on Channel 4 in the UK. She edits fiction for the Fiction Atelier (fictionatelier.wordpress.com), and abhors standard ways of teaching Creative Writing, which she considers mostly criminal. Though American by birth, she lives in Scotland.