Pete and Alice in Maine - by Caitlin Shetterly (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

"Gripping."--Richard Russo, author of Empire Falls

"Shetterly's debut achieves a subtle grace, a quality of light and shadow worthy of a Bergman film."--Allegra Goodman, New York Times Book Review

"Pete and Alice in Maine is a tender, big-hearted, clear-eyed portrait of a marriage, and a family, in crisis--set during the plague years when the entire world was in crisis. As she investigates the insidious effect of lies, betrayal, fear, and anger, not to mention the mundane joys and wrenching heartaches of everyday life, Caitlin Shetterly gets to the heart of what it means to be a family." -- Christina Baker Kline, New York Times bestselling author of The Exiles

A powerful and beautifully written debut novel that intimately explores a fractured marriage and the struggles of modern parenthood, set against the backdrop of the chaotic spring of 2020.

Reeling from a painful betrayal in her marriage as the Covid pandemic takes hold in New York City, Alice packs up her family and flees to their vacation home in Maine. She hopes to find sanctuary--from the uncertainties of the exploding pandemic and her faltering marriage.

Putting distance between herself and the stresses and troubles of the city, Alice begins to feel safe and relieved. But the locals are far from friendly. Trapped and forced into quarantine by hostile neighbors, Alice sees the imprisoning structure of her life in this new predicament. Stripped down to the bare essentials of survival and tending to the needs of her two children, she can no longer ignore all the ways in which she feels limited and lost--lost in the big city, lost as a wife, lost as a mother, lost as a daughter and lost as a person.

As the world shifts around her and the balance in her marriage tilts, Alice and her husband, Pete, are left to consider if what keeps their family safe is the same thing as what keeps their family together.

Review Quotes

"This novel has its thumb on the pulse of our times, the pandemic and all its costs and upheavals, our political and social fault lines, climate change as we try to raise children into a new world. Yet it is, at heart, a familiar and intimate story of a marriage and a family struggling within its own universe of hurt and betrayal. Shetterly refuses to offer easy answers in this powerful, beautifully written novel." - Meredith Hall, author of Beneficence and Without a Map
"When we first meet the title characters of Caitlin Shetterly's gripping novel Pete and Alice in Maine, they're fleeing pandemic ravaged New York with their children for the relative safety of their second home. How satisfying it would be in this age of easy social media judgment to despise them for their privilege. The only thing preventing it, really, is that this very fine novel--like all good novels--insists upon getting to know them. I loved it." - Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls
"What literature is going to come out of the present moment? How do things look from where we are right now? Caitlin Shetterly's Pete and Alice in Maine is one answer. A comfortable New Yorker and her family escape the city during the pandemic, but all is not well. Voice-driven, relatable, and very contemporary, this novel is a beautifully-written depiction of the inner lives of a small family and the land to which they briefly escape." - Debra Spark, author of And Then Something Happened and Unknown Caller
"In this taut, riveting novel, Shetterly has created a lush, raw world: a passionate and damaged marriage; a family coming apart and knitting back together during a pandemic; a starkly unwelcoming place that becomes home. In all its multi-layered emotional facets, this book cuts deep, moving and true to the end." - Kate Christensen, author of The Last Cruise
"This is the novel I've been waiting to read. Caitlin Shetterly's brilliant take on what happens when the worst happens to a couple days before the pandemic locks them together is simply fabulous. Funny and fierce, compassionate and uncompromising--I could continue pairing complimentary adjectives forever--best just to buy it and clear a weekend. You won't want to put it down." - Karen Karbo, author of The Gospel According to Coco Chanel
"Pete and Alice in Maine is a tender, big-hearted, clear-eyed portrait of a marriage, and a family, in crisis--set during the plague years when the entire world was in crisis. As she investigates the insidious effect of lies, betrayal, fear, and anger, not to mention the mundane joys and wrenching heartaches of everyday life, Caitlin Shetterly gets to the heart of what it means to be a family." - Christina Baker Kline, New York Times bestselling author of The Exiles
"Shetterly...gives voice to the fearful, isolated beginnings of COVID-19....With the tone and tenor of Matthew Norman's Last Couple Standing (2020), Sarah Pekkanen's The Ever After (2018), and Greg Olear's Fathermucker (2011), the story taps on every fault line within one family, as a whole world grapples with its own fragility. Heartwarming and heartwrenching in equal turns, Shetterly's foray into fiction is unforgettable." - Booklist (starred review)
"This debut reads like a sharp report from the near past." - Brown Alumni
"Pete and Alice in Maine is a splendid debut. . . . Shetterly's narrative is peppered with diverse cultural references. . . . Shetterly hits at the heart of [the pandemic years] in her very lively narrative." - The Working Waterfront