Undercurrents: A Novel - by Joan Maki (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Undercurrents, the debut novel from fourth-generation Montanan, Joan Maki, steps through forest doorways and crosses rivers into twilight's thresholds to dissect the emotional and psychological aftermath of Kit in the wake of the mysterious disappearance of Patrick, a childhood friend who vanished so suddenly it was as if he fell into the Earth. Decades after this incident, Kit escapes her rural Montana upbringing for a new life in the city, but her disjointed memories and the questions she has had to carry bind her to her past. Was Patrick claimed by natural forces, falling into the river or a ravine? Was his estranged father involved? Or, as old Marg believes, was the boy claimed by the people of the forest? Will Kit be able to find closure as she raises her own child and is inevitably drawn back toward the woods of home?

Imbued with elements of Finnish folklore, Undercurrents charts the liminal destruction of society and self, where wild and rural places are encroached upon by more contemporary forces. Like a story written on a warped mirror, Undercurrents presents a calm surface slightly askew, and definitely dangerous, where mind, lore, religion, and reality collide in uncanny reflections.

Review Quotes

"A haunted novel of knowing and not knowing, Undercurrents is a story of childhood fears, and the tragic loss of innocence when those fears come true. Maki does the seemingly impossible: writing both past and present simultaneously, marrying memory and reckoning in an entirely new way. Undercurrents is a stunning debut and introduces a shining new talent." - Elizabeth Gonzalez James, author of The Bullet Swallower

"Joan Maki's story-telling terrain is the permeable border between the explicit and the intuited, between the present and the remembered, between freedom and entrapment. In specific, incandescent sentences, her debut novel signals the presence of a singular talent and a new voice that is capable of conveying what is most untalkable and haunting about certain lives in the contemporary American West. Few readers will leave Undercurrents feeling unchanged." - Deirdre McNamer, author of Aviary

"In Joan Maki's darkly wondrous debut novel Undercurrents, the inexplicable folktale-infused disappearance of childhood friend Patrick traps siblings Kit and Paul in a decades-long, splintered cycle of attempted retelling. Told in trim, sparkling prose--and featuring mythic evocations of the woods, mountains, and cold rivers of Montana--this novel offers a masterful and moving portrait of the reality-bending mysteries of grief." - Joseph Scapellato, author of The Made-Up Man and Big Lonesome

About the Author

Joan Maki grew up on the farm acquired by her Finnish great-grandparents, stoking a deep affinity for open fields, pitch-black nights, and folklore. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from The University of Montana in Missoula, and lives in western Montana with her family. Undercurrents is her first novel.