Bookshelf: Domestic discord takes a dark turn in haunting ‘The Mad Wife’
This month features a slew of book events spotlighting a New York Times bestselling author, debut authors, poets and literary prize winners.
In “The Mad Wife” (Sourcebooks Landmark, $17.99), the haunting new novel by New York Times bestselling author Meagan Church, Lulu Mayfield is a 1950s-era suburban wife and mother famous among her neighbors for her towering congealed salads.
Try as she might, though, Lulu has trouble keeping up with her domestic duties. She tried adhering to the Good Housekeeping cleaning schedule (Monday: kitchen and groceries, Tuesday: laundry, etc.), but some days she just doesn’t feel like it. What she really wants to do is pursue her new interest in photography with a Kodak Duaflex camera, but her husband Henry gave her slippers for Christmas instead.
The problem with Lulu is, she has trouble standing up for herself. She keeps quiet about her hopes and dreams, her frustrations and disappointments. Not wanting to make waves in her marriage, she just smiles and complies while her unhappiness mounts. She also has a secret: She’s conflicted over her undisclosed pregnancy.
When a new family moves into the house across the street, Lulu becomes obsessed with the wife, Bitsy Betser, who Lulu believes hides a dark truth behind her constant smile. But Henry finds Lulu’s observations and suspicions increasingly hard to believe as her actions become erratic and she appears to spiral into mental illness.
The author of “The Last Carolina Girl” and “The Girls We Sent Away,” Church has built a fan base by writing engaging historical fiction about women who resist societal pressures to conform and institutional efforts to control them. With “The Mad Wife,” Church examines postwar domesticity and its unrealistic standards of motherhood and housekeeping — as well as the medical community’s failure to take women’s health concerns seriously.
Church will discuss her book’s themes in conversation with Kimberly Brock, author of “The Fabled Earth,” Nov. 7 at Poe & Co. bookstore in Milton. For details, go to poeandcompanybookstore.com.
Lost in the Letters, the nonprofit literary organization that recently opened a writer’s studio and bookstore in Candler Park, hosts its annual literary event, the Letters Festival, Nov. 14-15 at the Goat Farm.
The festival opens Friday evening with readings by Victoria Chang, the poetry chair at Georgia Tech and a Guggenheim fellow; Emrys Donaldson, author of the short story collection “The Iridescents” (Texas A&M University Press, 22.95), publishing in January; and Zefyr Lisowski, author of the new essay collection “Uncanny Valley Girls” (Harper Perennial, $14.40). Also on the bill is a dance performance by T. Lang.
Workshops in poetry, fiction and playwrighting will be held during the day on Saturday, followed by more readings that evening. Participating writers include poets Sommer Browning and Danika Stegeman; Doug Jones, author of “The Fantasies of Future Things” (Simon & Schuster, $27.99); and a monologue by playwright Dana Stringer.
For details, go to lostintheletters.org.
Georgia Center for the Book celebrates three 2025 Georgia Author of the Year fiction winners with readings and a reception Nov. 13 at Decatur Library. The authors include Parul Kapur, winner for first novel for “Inside the Mirror” (University of Nebraska Press, $26.95); Alan Grostephan, winner for literary novel for “The Banana Wars” (Dzanc Books, $7.99); and Suzi Ehtesham-Zadeh, winner for short story collection for “Zan” (Dzanc Books, $17.95).
For details, go to georgiacenterforthebook.org.
Suzanne Van Atten is a book critic and contributing editor to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. She may be reached at Suzanne.VanAtten@ajc.com.
