Mireille Duval Jameson is living a fairy tale. The strong-willed youngest daughter of one of Haiti’s richest sons, she has an adoring husband, a precocious infant son, by all appearances a perfect life. The fairy tale ends one day when Mireille is kidnapped in broad daylight by a gang of heavily armed men, in front of her father’s Port au Prince estate. Held captive by a man who calls himself The Commander, Mireille waits for her father to pay her ransom. As it becomes clear her father intends to resist the kidnappers, Mireille must endure the torments of a man who resents everything she represents.
An Untamed State is a novel of privilege in the face of crushing poverty, and of the lawless anger that corrupt governments produce. It is the story of a wilful woman attempting to find her way back to the person she once was, and of how redemption is found in the most unexpected of places. An Untamed State establishes Roxane Gay as a writer of prodigious, arresting talent.
An Untamed State is a novel of privilege in the face of crushing poverty, and of the lawless anger that corrupt governments produce. It is the story of a wilful woman attempting to find her way back to the person she once was, and of how redemption is found in the most unexpected of places. An Untamed State establishes Roxane Gay as a writer of prodigious, arresting talent.
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Reviews
Roxane Gay’s riveting debut, An Untamed State, captivates from its opening sentence and doesn’t let go . . . So let this be the year of Roxane Gay: You’ll tear through An Untamed State, but ponder it for long after.
Finished @rgay’s gripping and brilliant novel An Untamed State last night. It resists 140-character analysis, but wow.
An Untamed State is breathless, artful, disturbing and original. I won’t ever forget it.
A fairy tale . . . its complex and fragile moral arrived at through great pain and high cost. . . . Perhaps Haiti, too, is a beautiful princess, well-versed in the vagaries of men, still searching for a happily ever after.
Gay's novel puts a face, a name and especially a voice to the rampant global violence against women.
Once you start this book, you will not be able to put it down. An Untamed State is a novel of hope intermingled with fear, a book about possibilities mixed with horror and despair. It is written at a pace that will match your racing.
I read An Untamed State in one sitting – I realize that it's absolutely cliche to say "I couldn't put it down" but from the other reviews I've seen of the book, I can see that I'm not alone in that sentiment.
A smart, searing novel.