In the Aftermath
Adult; General Fiction (including literary and historical); (Market)
When David Herron—overwhelmed and despairing, his family’s business and finances in ruin due to the bursting lending bubble of 2008—takes his own life one chilly spring morning, he has no idea the ripple effect his decision will set into motion.
Two years later, his widow, Jules, is now an employee of the bakery she and David used to own—and still full of bitterness over David’s lies, perceived cowardice, and ultimate abandonment of her and their now-teenage daughter, Rennie. Rennie, meanwhile, struggles socially at school, resents her work-obsessed mother, and is convinced she’s to blame for her father’s death.
When Denise, the former police detective who worked (and, due to her own personal struggles at the time, mishandled) David’s case, catches sight of Rennie at her sons’ school, she’s struck by the girl’s halo of sadness—and becomes obsessed with attempting to right the wrongs she believes she perpetrated two years ago.
And as all this unfolds in Boston, Daniel, the guilt-ridden young man who, in his old life as a banker, helped create the circumstances that led to David’s suicide, continues to punish himself for his sins by living half a life, working odd jobs and bouncing from one US city to another, never staying long enough to make friends or build something lasting.
Ultimately, each of these very different people—all of them tied together by one tragic event—must learn in their own way how to say good-bye to the past and move into a brighter future.
Plot/Idea: 9 out of 10
Originality: 7 out of 10
Prose: 10 out of 10
Character/Execution: 10 out of 10
Overall: 9.00 out of 10
Assessment:
Plot: Ward has written a delicate novel about suicide and its implications on those who it touches. Although this is a bit of a trope and has been done many times, the way in which she interweaves differing stories of people who were affected is unique and insightful.
Prose: Ward's prose is lovely. She is able to throw the reader into the minds of her characters, as well as the settings. The reader can smell, hear, see, feel everything going on around them. Her metaphors, sentence structure, and diction are excellent.
Originality: The book features a nuclear family that is dealing with the after effects of a father's suicide. Although this is not a particularly uncommon theme, Ward has presented it in a unique manner, giving voices to a wide array of characters who have been deeply affected by this death.
Character/Execution: The characters of In the Aftermath make the story feel real for the reader. Ward is adept at writing characters of all different ages and genders, and this really plays into how well the novel works.
Date Submitted: June 26, 2021