If You Left

A seductive novel about a privileged but damaged Manhattan wife whose main source of stability her marriage comes under threat, from forces both without and within. For most of their marriage, Althea has fluctuated betweenextreme depressive and manic states what she calls';the Tombs' and ';the Visions' andOliver has been the steady hand that guided her to safety. This summer, Altheadecidesthat she will be different from here on. She will be the loving, sexy wife Oliver wants, and the reliable, affectionate mother their nine year-old daughter Clem deserves.Her plan: tobring Clem to their Easthampton home once school is out with no ';summer girl' to care for her this time and become ';normal.'But Oliver is distant and controlling, and his relationship with their interior decorator seems a bit too close; Clem has learned to be self-sufficient, and getting to know her now feels like very hard work for Althea. Into this scene enters the much younger, David Foster Wallacereading house painter, whoreaches something in Althea that has been long buried.Fearless, darkly funny, and compulsively readable, If You Leftexplores the complex dance that is the bipolar marriage, and the possibility that to move forward, we might have to destroythe very thingsweve worked hardest to build.