Description: Set in rural Kentucky and told from the perspective of seventeen-year-old Marie Massey, this gut-wrenching novel about addiction and family ties offers an unflinching look at the opioid crisis and its devastating effects on a generation of young Americans.
Brief description: Carrie Mullins is a fiction writer whose work has been published in Chicago Quarterly Review, Appalachian Heritage, Kudzu, and the online literary journal Still. Her short story "Cell-Life" appears in Appalachia Now: Short Stories of Contemporary Appalachia (Bottom Dog Press, 2015). Mullins grew up in Mt. Vernon, Kentucky, where she still lives. Night Garden is her first novel.
Review Quotes: "A riveting story told by a master of suspenseful writing. In an era when fiction is loaded with issues and agendas and ambitions, Carrie Mullins' debut novel is a wholly absorbing narrative that reminds the reader of the pure pleasure of story. Unforgettable characters, an intricate plot, and strong sense of regional place give the novel extraordinary appeal. The author's spare writing style and her word-perfect, tone-perfect dialogue, place Night Garden in company with the best contemporary American fiction."--Gurney Norman, author of Ancient Creek and Allegiance