An Instant New York Times Bestseller!Lapvona flips all the conventions of familial and parental
relations putting hatred where love should be or a negotiation where grief should be . . .
Through a mix of witchery deception murder abuse grand delusion ludicrous conversations
and cringeworthy moments of bodily disgust Moshfegh creates a world that you definitely don’t
want to live in but from which you can’t look away.” —The AtlanticIn a village buffeted by
natural disasters a motherless shepherd boy finds himself part of a power struggle that puts
the community’s faith to a savage test in a spellbinding novel that represents Ottessa
Moshfegh’s most exciting leap yetLittle Marek the abused and delusional son of the village
shepherd believes his mother died giving birth to him. One of Marek’s few consolations is his
enduring bond with the blind village midwife Ina who suckled him when he was a baby. For some
people Ina’s ability to receive transmissions of sacred knowledge from the natural world is a
godsend. For others Ina’s home in the woods is a godless place.The people’s desperate need to
believe that there are powers that be who have their best interests at heart is put to a cruel
test by their depraved lord and governor especially in this year of record drought and famine.
But when fate brings Marek into violent proximity to the lord’s family new and occult forces
arise to upset the old order. By year’s end the veil between blindness and sight life and
death and the natural world and the spirit world will prove to be very thin indeed.
