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Content snapshot
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Violence
Very heavy
Severe physical and sexual abuse depicted throughout; violence as the texture of daily life in this household
Language
A lot
Strong language in a rural Northern California register
Sexual Content
A lot
Sexual abuse of a minor by a parent — the central and most disturbing element of the novel
Substance Use
Some
The father drinks heavily; alcohol and neglect are intertwined
Emotional Intensity
Very heavy
Sustained psychological abuse and destruction of a child's identity; the long process of recognizing one's situation; the horror of normalized cruelty
What this book is about
Turtle Alveston is fourteen years old and lives in a remote cabin on the Northern California coast with her father Martin, who calls her his absolute darling. Martin is brilliant, charismatic, and completely terrifying — a man who has spent years systematically destroying his daughter's sense of self through violence, sexual abuse, and emotional domination. When Turtle meets two boys in the woods and begins to understand that other fathers are different, something shifts. Gabriel Tallent's debut is a devastating portrait of abuse and survival, written with enormous precision and care. It is a difficult book that does not look away — and one that ends in something close to hope.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
graphic physical and sexual child abuse throughout
one of the most intense depictions of parental abuse in contemporary fiction
strong language
for mature adults only
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