Ultraviolet

For readers who loved Joan Silber's IMPROVEMENT, Jane Smiley's GOLDEN AGE, Mary Gaitskill's THE MARE, or Margaret Wilkerson Sexton's A KIND OF FREEDOM, this intergenerational story, set largely in the American West, is a compelling choice for libraries, book clubs and reading groups Tenderhearted and sharply observed, ULTRAVIOLET features strong, irresistible female characters and interwoven storylines that move deftly through the decades of the twentieth century As we follow the characters through the course of their lives, Matson quietly and movingly connects the similarities between childhood and the end of life, and celebrates the ways we exchange the role of caregiver with our parents over time Suzanne Matson has active connections to the literary communities on the East and West coasts, and we expect resounding enthusiasm for her new novel from Portland, OR (her hometown) to Boston, MA (her current and longtime place of residence) Catapult will be pursuing an Indie Next Pick for ULTRAVIOLET, as well as a bi-coastal author tour and major national media attention for this important and perhaps underappreciated American author Matson's favorite local bookstores are Newtonville Books, Brookline Booksmith, and Porter Square Books Author events in Newton, MA; Boston, MA; Cambridge, MA; South Hadley, MA; Providence, RI; Atlanta, GA; Athens, GA; Portland, OR; and Seattle, WA throughout the months of September, October, and November Ultraviolet finds Suzanne Matson digging into her inner Elizabeth Strout, as she offers up three generations of women, each discovering their independence, in and away from family. Beginning in India and ending up in Boston, Matson offers up short stories, each a snapshot of a time in one or more of the women's lives. Each snapshot is self-contained, but taken as a whole, they offer a lovely, yet unflinching, look at family, love, death, and the way our own values affect our lives. It is quite an achievement, and it's a terrific book! --William Carl, Wellesley Books (Wellesley, MA) Suzanne Mason's Ultraviolet feels like a biography of sorts; we dip in on Kay's childhood in 1930s India, life as a suburban wife in 1950s Portland, and as an old woman in 2000s Boston. However, in Matson's hands, Kay's multigenerational story is framed much like real women's narratives: backgrounds are hinted, threads dangled, and once-good friends disappear. It is a novel of the moments our grandmothers and mothers omit when we ask them about their lives (a favorite coat, a conversation on a train, an afternoon of sledding, lunch with an aunt): quiet, everyday, yet tremendously shaping to their story. Ultraviolet is a skillfully written, understated novel of how we come into ourselves. --Molly Gillespie, Joseph-Beth Booksellers (Cincinnati, OH)

About the Author :
Suzanne Matson was born in Portland, Oregon, and studied at Portland State University and the University of Washington. Her first novel, The Hunger Moon, was a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers pick. Her third, The Tree-Sitter, was short-listed for the PEN New England/L. L. Winship Award. She has published two poetry collections with Alice James Books, teaches at Boston College, and lives in Newton, Massachusetts.

Review :
Praise for Ultraviolet Named a Best Book of 2018 by Real Simple This unostentatious yet intricate novel follows the women of a family across nearly a century . . . Domestic scenes emit blasts of emotional life, as the women grapple with the 'swooning collapse and then the expanding distance' between their interior lives and the outside world. --The New Yorker This sprawling, beautiful novel follows the lives of three generations of women . . . It's an emotional, poignant look at the ways in which our dreams for ourselves often fall apart, and how even lives that seem quietly lived are filled with profound meaning. --NYLON Explores the lives of several generations of one family across America and overseas--and in doing so ventures to unexpected emotional states. --Vol. 1 Brooklyn Fascinating and stirring. . . . Matson glides through her characters' lives in almost self-contained chapters punctuated by explosions of burnished emotion. . . . Readers will latch on to the unforgettable characters of this accomplished saga of the shifting personal and historical complications of American womanhood. --Publishers Weekly (starred review) Matson's chapters, each of which jumps forward in time, conclude with an especially poignant reflection on aging, as Samantha cares for her dying mother in her final days. This is a stoic view of mother-daughter love: an unsentimental reflection on both the tribulations and the importance of filial connection. --Kirkus Reviews Fans of Anne Tyler and Geraldine Brooks will enjoy the intertwined, intergenerational narratives; historical details; and emotional depth of this engrossing novel. Booklist From its wonderful opening in 1930s India, Suzanne Matson's beautifully accurate and illuminating Ultraviolet follows the fates of three generations of American women along the shifting borders of safety and freedom. As time carries them past risks and refuges, the reader is left with a shimmering sense of lives lived. --Joan Silber, author of Improvement Capacious, unsentimental and yet forgiving, Ultraviolet brings us both the intimacy of women's lives and their trajectories across continents and generations. This is Suzanne Matson at her wisest and deepest--wonderful. --Gish Jen, author of The Girl at the Baggage Claim Acutely, elegantly, Suzanne Matson traces her characters' paths from the hills of colonial India to the suburban American West to the dislocated excesses of an Alaskan cruise ship. Here are the women in a family and the impact they have--or fail to have--on one another. And here, in the silences between vivid moments, we see how years pass, how lives pass, how a century passes. --Joan Wickersham, author of The News from Spain and The Suicide Index Praise for The Tree-Sitter (2006) "Through the lens of first love, Suzanne Matson raises questions of morality and responsibility, of idealism and identity. . . . It's rare for fiction to push its protagonist and its readers to such moral dilemmas, but Matson is unflinching." --Ann Hood, author of Morningstar "The Tree-Sitter is one of those rare, elegantly written, quietly intense books that, without resorting to sensationalism or fanfare, winds up keeping you awake at night." --Suzanne Berne, author of The Dogs of Littlefield "With its vivid characters, suspenseful plot, and moral complexity, this is a wonderful and very timely novel." --Margot Livesey, author of Mercury "At once luminous and dark, The Tree-Sitter asks age-old questions in a brand-new world. This is Suzanne Matson's most gripping, resonant, and timely book to date." --Elizabeth Graver, author of The End of the Point "A confounding but compelling romance with impeccable timing." --Los Angeles Times Praise for A Trick of Nature (2000) "A compelling, unpredictable narrative that moves beyond its calm suburban setting into darker social and psychological territory. Suzanne Matson's gripping second novel only confirms what readers of The Hunger Moon already know: she is a writer of uncommon wisdom and emotional depth." --Tom Perrotta, author of Mrs. Fletcher "Like Ann Hood and Sue Miller, Suzanne Matson captures average people reevaluating their once comfortable domesticity as middle age slowly approaches. In delivering the Goodmans' stumbling marriage, A Trick of Nature plumbs the attractions and terrors of giving up the familiar for an uncertain freedom." --Stewart O'Nan, author of City of Secrets "A compassionate psychological portrait of one family's slow unraveling--A Trick of Nature skillfully charts the often unpredictable aftershocks of tragedy." --A. Manette Ansay, author of Good Things I Wish You "So skillfully does Matson describe the calm before the marital storm that it's possible to be lulled right along with them into their own blind harmony." --Boston Book Review Praise for The Hunger Moon (1997) "In this fast-moving, elegantly crafted novel, Suzanne Matson traces the arch and swoop of women moving through each other's lives." --Pagan Kennedy, author of Inventology "Matson has given us a poet's-eye view--not just the behaviors but the emotional map as well." --Harvard Review "A lovely, engaging first novel about the intersections between three women at very different points in their lives, each looking both inward and outward to find her place in the world." --Melanie Thernstrom, author of The Pain Chronicles "Crisp, clean writing. . . . Compassionately drawn characters. . . . Matson examines the full sweep of women's lives." --The New York Times Book Review