Eden

As teenagers, Hope and her sister, Eden, accepted a ride from a stranger named Larry who claimed to have been sent by their father to pick them up. This novel picks up decades later, when Hope--a struggling playwright--attempts to track down Eden, whom she has lost contact with, for reasons relating to the aftermath of that fateful night. "Eden" is a slow-paced, sometimes tense novel that shifts back and forth between Hope's adult life and her encounter with Larry, slowly revealing the trauma from her past. This back-and-forth shifting of time perspectives is what makes this novel work so well; told linearly, the story would be much less interesting and suspenseful. But at the heart of the novel are the themes of guilt and survival: What does it mean to survive a horrific trauma? Can Hope's father ever forgive himself for the mistake that led him not be there to pick the girls up himself? One of the most searing passages in the entire book, for me, was the section on pp. 177-179 where Hope envisions her father looking at the calendar and realizing that he had mixed the weekends up: "He will squint at the dates...Then he will start to get nervous. His stomach will feel dry. He won't know what to do. His legs will be frozen....And my dad will finally snap out of it and grab the phone and desperately dial my mom's number..." Any parent who has ever had the heart-sinking experience of not being able to locate their young child (and this includes pretty much every parent who ever lived) can empathize with Hope's father's anguish in this moment. This novel also explores the truth that even when traumatic events have a "happy" ending (Hope and Eden, after all, survive their abduction), the psychological effects can be long-lasting. Hope is barely functioning as an independent adult when the novel opens, unemployed and having just been kicked out of the illegal sublet she was staying in after the dissolution of her one long-term relationship. As she muses toward the end of the novel, "Somewhere in my head I thought surviving Larry gave me a certain kind of strength, an invincibility. No one could destroy me. Although, at the moment, I appeared to be doing a good job of destroying myself." Her search for Eden provides the vehicle for processing what had happened to both of them and offers the possibility of both closure and moving on. This is in many ways a dark and disturbing novel. But Kleine is a gifted novelist, and her characters--even the minor ones playing bit roles--sparkle with complexity and individuality. I look forward to reading more of her work.

I enjoyed it. A not-so-young woman anymore searching for her absentee sister to finally deal with a heinous crime they both experienced many years before. In the end, the author tells us, you must heal yourself and not rely on others. It’s well put together and each character fleshed out with a story that moves quickly. Looking forward to other work by the writer.

This was a miss for me. Forced myself to finish it but mostly skimmed the last half because it was so bland. Not sure how it’s called a “thriller”. The end was very disappointing and stilted. There didn’t seem to be follow through with any of the “events” throughout the book. Like the author couldn’t figure out how to segue from one thing to the next. Choppy.

This is a great read. Hope is a mesmerizing character. You feel all of her emotions: pain, longing, fear, her profound sense of failure. Hope and her older sister Eden were kidnapped when they were teenagers. Their father forgot to pick them up. Their kid paper Larry is up for parole and Hope has received a !after from the DA asking if she and Eden want to write a !after to the parole board,but Hope has lost Eden. The book is about her search for Eden and Her narrative of the kidnapping. I couldn't put "Eden" down. Loved events imperfections. Hope (a word y you cannot get away from in the context of this book) you enjoy this novel as much as I did.

My profession as a psychiatric RN has led me to work that I value as necessary and significant—working with children and teens that have suffered childhood trauma. Andrea Kleine’s new novel focuses squarely on the adults that they become, and their family members, and how others perceive them. Does childhood trauma underscore your life as an adult, does it ruin you, does it DEFINE you? These themes are explored with purpose, and within an intense and absorbing storyline, never reducing or simplifying the ramifications of the trauma itself (which we know as PTSD). A stranger abducted Hope and her half-sister Eden when they were teens. The experience they shared is gradually unraveled poignantly over course of the book. For decades, 35-year-old Hope, a mostly failed playwright, has not seen or heard from her sister. Over the years, Eden and her family, including Eden’s hippie-commune mother, has lost contact with Eden. But, after becoming dislocated and jobless, and provoked by a call from the DA that the perpetrator could be released soon unless he can be tied to another crime, Hope embarks on a vision quest to find her half-sister. The road trip begins in Hope’s father’s old and temperamental camper, and leads her on a journey to people from her past, and to unwitting strangers, all who play a part to help crack open both repressed and obscured insights buried within her. Tying her experiences and the disparate and sometimes desultory clues together is as complicated as Hope is complex. Her ex-girlfriend thinks that Hope fetishizes this event as a way to prevent moving forward, and her father suggests that Hope is wasting her time, and should just finally grow up. But he is paralyzed with guilt and blame. Often, Hope perceives that everyone has moved on except herself, but also notices how trivial or guarded they are. There are few people she can trust, like her suicidal, drug addicted, and successful and celebrated artist friend, Zara. She told her, “...you decided your life was about writing plays and trying to get at the truth of something…And now that’s who you are. You’re sort of like a junkie. You use what’s in front of you to pay for you fix.” When Hope asks her what she’s addicted to, Zara responds, “To continuing.” Hope continues the journey, her labile thoughts contained but directing her. If you are looking for easy answers or a bow to tie this up, you’ll be disappointed. On the other hand, Kleine’s window into making sense of your past, written in frank but forgiving prose, explores how art intersects with life and conveys sharp insights about trauma, attachment, and memory.

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