The author of Good Neighbors one of the creepiest most unnerving deconstructions of American suburbia Ive ever read (NPR) returns with a cunning out-of-the-box satirical thriller about a familys odyssey into an exclusive enclave for the wealthy that might not be as ideal as it seems.Youll be safe here. Thats what the greasy tour guide tells the Farmer-Bowens when they visit Plymouth Valley a walled-off company town with clean air pantries that never go empty and blue-ribbon schools. On a very trial basis the company offers to hire Linda Farmers husband a numbers genius and relocate her whole family to this bucolic paradise for the .0001%. Though Linda will have to sacrifice her medical career back home the family jumps at the opportunity. Theyd be crazy not to take it. With the outside world literally falling apart this might be the Farmer-Bowens last chance. But fitting in takes work. The pampered locals distrust outsiders cruelly snubbing Linda Russell and their teen twins. And the residents fervently adhere to a group of customs and beliefs called Hollow...but what exactly is Hollow? Its Linda who brokers acceptance by volunteering her medical skills to the most powerful people in town with their pet charity ActHollow. In the months afterward everything seems fine. Sure Russell starts hyperventilating through a paper bag in the middle of the night and the kids have drifted like bridgeless islands but living heres worth sacrificing their familys closeness isnt it? At least theyll survive. The trouble is the locals never say what they think. They seem scared. And Hollows ominous culminating event the Plymouth Valley Winter Festival is coming. Lindas warned by her husband and her powerful new friends to stop asking questions. But the more she learns the more frightened she becomes. Should the Farmer-Bowens be fighting to stay or fighting to get out? Sarah Langans latest novel A Better World is gleefully ruthless in its dissection of wealth power and privilege timely in its depiction of a self-destructing world--and it is a prescient warning to us all.
