Explore our new BookBrowse Community Forum!

Book Summary and Reviews of Mothers and Sons by Adam Haslett

Mothers and Sons by Adam Haslett

Mothers and Sons

A Novel

by Adam Haslett

  • Critics' Consensus:
  • Publishes:
  • Jan 7, 2025, 336 pages
  • Rate this book

  • Buy This Book

About this book

Book Summary

A mother and son, estranged for years, must grapple with the shared secret that drove their lives apart in this enthralling story about family, forgiveness, and how a fleeting act of violence can change a life forever, by "one of the country's most talented writers" (Wall Street Journal).

At forty, Peter, an asylum lawyer in New York City, is overworked and isolated. He spends his days immersed in the struggles of immigrants only to return to an empty apartment and occasional hook-ups with a man who wants more than Peter can give. But when the asylum case of a young gay man pierces Peter's numbness, the event that he has avoided for twenty years returns to haunt him.

Ann, his mother, who runs a women's retreat center she founded after leaving his father, is hurt by the estrangement from Peter but cherishes the world she has built. She long ago put behind her the decision that divided her from her son. But as Peter's case plunges him further into the fraught memory of his first love and the night of violence that changed his life, he and his mother must confront the secret that tore them apart.

With unsurpassed emotional depth, Mothers and Sons reveals all that is lost by looking away from the past and the love that might be restored by facing it. In his spellbinding new novel, Adam Haslett demonstrates yet again his mastery of "a rich assortment of literary gifts" (New York Times).

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

"A family-in-crisis story that keenly captures deep-seated fears and regrets…The strength of Haslett's storytelling is its deliberation, slowly peeling back the veneers of Peter's and Ann's professional accomplishments and cool public personas to reveal storms of guilt and fear…Haslett's sophisticated grasp of the ways that people over-police their feelings makes it a remarkably acute and effective character study." ―Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"Irresistible…Themes of guilt, new beginnings, survival, and violence permeate the excellent and subtle story of characters grappling with events beyond their control, and the author, himself an immigration lawyer, delivers a deeply personal portrait of Peter's tenacious advocacy for his clients. This matches the heights of Haslett's best work." ―Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"This deeply satisfying novel is a revelation—a thoughtful, psychologically acute, beautifully written examination of intersecting lives. The characters come alive on the page, commanding readers' attention. This novel is sure to receive accolades, and it richly deserves them." —Booklist (starred review)

"Mothers and Sons is both moving and deeply compelling, a story about the search for our own humanity, and the lengths we will go to maintain it. A new book by Adam Haslett is always cause for celebration. He is one of our very best writers." ―Ann Patchett, New York Times bestselling author of Tom Lake and The Dutch House

"Mothers and Sons is like sonar in a lake, pinging out everything submerged, the hidden stories, the shames and the joys. There's nothing else like it. Haslett's characters feel so real, their choices so hard, their lives so true. He is everything you want in a writer." ―Andrew Sean Greer, Pulitzer Prize–winning and New York Times bestselling author of Less

This information about Mothers and Sons was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Author Information

Adam Haslett Author Biography

Photo: Brigitte Lacombe

Adam Haslett is the author of the short story collection You Are Not a Stranger Here and the novel Union Atlantic. His story collection was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize and a National Book Award, and his books have been translated into eighteen languages. His journalism and fiction have appeared in The Financial Times, Esquire, New York Magazine, The New Yorker, The Nation, The Atlantic Monthly, Zoetrope All-Story, Best American Short Stories, The O'Henry Prize Stories, and National Public Radio's Selected Shorts. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Fine Arts Work Center, and in 2006, he won the PEN/Malamud Award for accomplishment in short fiction. He has also won the PEN/Winship Award for the best book by a New England ...

... Full Biography
Author Interview
Link to Adam Haslett's Website

Other books by Adam Haslett at BookBrowse
  • Union Atlantic jacket
  • Imagine Me Gone jacket
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

More Recommendations

Readers Also Browsed . . .

more literary fiction...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Top Picks

  • Book Jacket: Graveyard Shift
    Graveyard Shift
    by M. L. Rio
    Following the success of her debut novel, If We Were Villains, M. L. Rio's latest book is the quasi-...
  • Book Jacket: The Sisters K
    The Sisters K
    by Maureen Sun
    The Kim sisters—Minah, Sarah, and Esther—have just learned their father is dying of ...
  • Book Jacket: Linguaphile
    Linguaphile
    by Julie Sedivy
    From an infant's first attempts to connect with the world around them to the final words shared with...
  • Book Jacket
    The Rest of You
    by Maame Blue
    At the start of Maame Blue's The Rest of You, Whitney Appiah, a Ghanaian Londoner, is ringing in her...

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    Pony Confidential
    by Christina Lynch

    In this whimsical mystery, a grumpy pony must clear his beloved human's name from a murder accusation.

Who Said...

Common sense is genius dressed in its working clothes.

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

F the M

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.