The First Day Of Spring - Nancy Tucker

Fiction

Rating: 8/10

Don’t be fooled by the title, this is no frothy and frivolous read to launch you into the much-anticipated summer reading season.  This is a story that is equally malignant and merciful.

The novel is told through two narrative voices, one an eight- year-old girl and the other that same girl at the age of twenty-five.  The eight-year-old version of this women has killed a boy. And not by accident, but with unequivocal intent.  Her twenty-five-year-old self is living in society and has become mother to a child of her own.

That alone is enough to terrify any reader, but the author meticulously captures both the naivete you would expect from a child and the apathetic disdain that child has for others. The resulting tone is deeply unsettling, to say the least.  The author could have applied this talent to simply paint this girl as a bad seed, but instead showed her as an adult with an understanding of her actions and a desire for redemption for the sake of herself and her child. And in the depiction of a childhood of depravation and neglect reminded us that we are formed as much of nurture as we are of nature.  Or, as the case may be, the lack thereof.

Book Pairing(s): Dear Child By Romy Hausman, Darling Rose Gold By Stephanie Wrobel, The Push By Ashley Audrain