I Have Some Questions For You

Description

The riveting new novel from the author of The Great Believers, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award A successful film professor and podcaster, Bodie Kane is content to forget her past: the family tragedy that marred her adolescence, her four largely miserable years at a New Hampshire boarding school, and the 1995 murder of a classmate, Thalia Keith. Though the circumstances surrounding Thalia's death and the conviction of the school's athletics coach, Omar Evans, are the subject of intense fascination online, Bodie prefers-needs-to let sleeping dogs lie. But when The Granby School invites her back to teach a two-week course, Bodie finds herself inexorably drawn to the case and its increasingly apparent flaws. In their rush to convict Omar, did the school and the police overlook other suspects? Is the real killer still out there? As she falls down the very rabbit hole she was so determined to avoid, Bodie begins to wonder if she wasn't as much of an outsider at Granby as she'd thought-if, perhaps, back in 1995, she knew something that might have held the key to solving the case. One of the most acclaimed contemporary American writers, Rebecca Makkai reinvents herself with each of her brilliant novels. Both a transfixing mystery and a deeply felt examination of one woman's reckoning with her past, I Have Some Questions for You is her finest achievement yet.

Rebecca Makkai is the author of two novels and a collection of short stories. Her work has appeared in The Best American Short Stories, The Best American Nonrequired Reading, Best American Fantasy, Harper's, Tin House, Ploughshares, Iowa Review, Indiana Review, Michigan Quarterly Review and New England Review, among others. She lives outside Chicago with her husband and two daughters.

I've been waiting years for a book like this! You will laugh, think, think again, cry and stay up all night finishing it. Unputdownable and unforgettable. Makkai has written the book of the season -- Andrew Sean Greer, author of Less Is Lost In this addictive page-turner, Makkai skewers how and why missing girls become media commodities * Oprah Daily * This is sure to be a hit * Publishers Weekly, starred review * Both wide-angle observer and genius provocateur, Bodie is so real readers will expect to find her in their own yearbooks. Chilled as the deep New England winters during which it takes place and twisty with the slowly found and then suddenly illuminated branches of memory, Makkai's rich, winding story dazzles from cover to cover. * Booklist, starred review * Part boarding school drama, part forensic whodunnit, I HAVE SOME QUESTIONS FOR YOU is a true literary mystery -haunting and hard to put down -- Jennifer Egan, Pulitzer winner and author of The Candy House Both a deeply satisfying crime story and a thoughtful, even provocative, novel of ideas, I Have Some Questions for You narrates one woman's interrogation of her own past while in turn posing difficult questions directly to its reader: about sex, power, privilege, and the ambient violence of contemporary American life. What a feat of storytelling -- Rumaan Alam, author of Leave the World Behind One of the things I love most about Rebecca Makkai is her absolutely engaging written voice; reading her books feels like hearing a well-told story by a longtime friend. This book - through the voice of its beautifully complex narrator, Bodie Kane - brings readers along on a journey they won't forget -- Liz Moore, author of Long Bright River Rebecca Makkai's extraordinary storytelling gifts are on full display in I Have Some Questions for You, a tense, sharply drawn, and impeccably plotted literary mystery and an urgent, propulsive story of the collision of gender, race, and class in a New England boarding school. I loved walking alongside narrator Bodie Kane - angry, obsessive, struggling with her own traumatic memories - in her imperfect attempts to reckon with a past she longs to leave behind -- Elizabeth Wetmore, author of Valentine I was sure the true crime podcast novel was dead by now - at least, until I picked up Rebecca Makkai's latest, which completely revitalizes this common trope. A professional podcaster returns to the private school she once attended to teach a two week seminar on podcasting and journalism; one of her students decides to investigate a 90s-era murder that the podcaster was much closer to than she lets on to her students. Every year, I look for the novels that truly respect their victims, and think carefully about the tropes of true crime; for 2023, this is that novel * CrimeReads, Most Anticipated Books on Fall 2022 and Beyond * I adored I Have Some Questions For You. It was so beautifully stitched together, and the voice was desolate, detached, perfection. The looping nature of the narrative, the Serial-esque telling - everything was propulsive but also meandering in a way that had a vice-like control. My favourite book I've read this year, what an absolute triumph -- Heather Darwent, author of The Things We Do To Our Friends Some books are so universal that they feel bizarrely specific: I read I Have Some Questions for You as if it was written just for me, but I can't imagine who wouldn't love it. Timely, provocative, nuanced, generous-Rebecca Makkai astonishes once again with the perfect combination of brains and heart * Laura Lippmann, author of Dream Girl * Rebecca Makkai's extraordinary storytelling gifts are on full display in I Have Some Questions for You, a tense, sharply drawn, and impeccably plotted literary mystery and an urgent, propulsive story of the collision of gender, race, and class in a New England boarding school. I loved walking alongside narrator Bodie Kane-angry, obsessive, struggling with her own traumatic memories-in her imperfect attempts to reckon with a past she longs to leave behind * Elizabeth Wetmore, author of Valentine * [Makkai is] stunningly versatile * Harper's Bazaar * [Makkai adds] intriguing layers of complication . . . Well plotted, well written, and well designed * Kirkus Reviews *