Clock Dance

Starred review from May 7, 2018
Pulitzer winner Tyler (following A Spool of Blue Thread) takes a bittersweet, hope-filled look at two quirky families that have broken apart and are trying to find their way back to one another. Plaintive Willa is the link between her own fractured Pennsylvania family—rebellious sister Elaine, long-suffering dad Melvin, and “tempestuous” and abusive mom Alice—and that of lonely Baltimore single mom Denise and her precocious, love-starved daughter, Cheryl. The novel’s first half follows Willa as she negotiates her troubled teenage years in the 1960s and her 20s and 30s in the ’70s, her reluctant marriage to college sweetheart Derek, and her late-in-life second marriage with stuffy retiree Peter. The narrative then jumps to 2017, when Willa gets a breathless call to come to Baltimore to help take care of Cheryl, the young daughter of her son’s recent ex-girlfriend, as Cheryl’s mom, Denise, recovers from a mysterious shot in the leg. There, Willa settles amiably in a neighborhood of misfits, hooligans, and steely survivors—and explores her own family miseries. The cast of sharply drawn characters dominates in ways both reflective and raucous across a series of emotional events, such as Willa’s baffling encounter with a would-be hijacker, a heartbreaking moment with her elderly dad, and the jolting advice she receives from a kindhearted doctor. It’s a stellar addition to Tyler’s prodigious catalogue. 250,000-copy announced first printing.