Elsey Come Home

A Novel

By: Susan Conley

Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell

Length: 5 hrs and 50 mins

Publisher's summary

One of the “best women’s fiction of 2019 (so far)” (Marie Claire)
One of the “61 books we’re looking forward to reading in 2019” (The Huffington Post)
One of the “16 fiction releases to watch for” (Washington Independent Review of Books)
One of the “best new books coming out winter 2019” (Southern Living)
One of the “10 newly-released books that will give you an excuse to stay indoors this winter” (O Magazine)

“I loved, loved this novel.” (Lily King)

From the widely praised author of Paris Was the Place - a shattering new novel that bravely delves into the darkest corners of addiction, marriage, and motherhood.

When Elsey's husband, Lukas, hands her a brochure for a weeklong mountain retreat, she knows he is really giving her an ultimatum: Go, or we're done. Once a successful painter, Elsey set down roots in China after falling passionately for Lukas, the tall, Danish MC at a warehouse rave in downtown Beijing. Now, with two young daughters and unable to find a balance between her identities as painter, mother, and, especially, wife, Elsey fills her days worrying, drinking, and descending into desperate unhappiness. So, brochure in hand, she agrees to go and confront the ghosts of her past.

There, she meets a group of men and women who will forever alter the way she understands herself: from Tasmin, another (much richer) expat, to Hunter, a young man whose courage endangers them all, and, most important, Mei - wife of one of China's most famous artists and a renowned painter herself - with whom Elsey quickly forges a fierce friendship and whose candidness about her pain helps Elsey understand her own.

But Elsey must risk tearing herself and Lukas further apart when she decides she must return to her childhood home - the center of her deepest pain - before she can find her way back to him.

Written in a voice at once wry, sensual, blunt, and hypnotic, Elsey Come Home is a modern odyssey and a quietly dynamic portrait of contemporary womanhood.

©2019 Susan Conley (P)2019 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“Elsey used to be a recognized painter, but now she’s the wife of expat Danish musician Lukas and the mother of two girls under 10, and she’s tethered to their home in China. As the slim novel opens, she’s depressed and lost and in crisis; at Lukas’ insistence, she leaves the family for a weeklong retreat that will end up transforming her. Even within a few paragraphs of this exploration of motherhood and individuality, Elsey’s voice and emotional turbulence leap off the page.” (The Huffington Post)

“Described as ‘perfect’ by Judy Blume herself, Susan Conley’s new novel follows Elsey, a woman living in Beijing struggling to reconcile her identities as painter, mother, expat, individual, and wife. When the novel opens, Elsey is drinking heavily and descending rapidly into misery. Her husband suggests she take part in a retreat, where she meets a handful of strangers who change her life. It’s a necessary look at the identity crisis women can face when the world forces them into boxes.” (Marie Claire)

“Beautifully written.... The intriguing descriptions of life in China are a reminder that Americans, like people of other nations, sometimes emigrate and make their home elsewhere. In the end then, this is a thought-provoking novel.” (Washington Times)

Deeply intimate journey with a mother and family

Just went on a road trip and listened to it in two parts. A an engaging story that drew me in to each character and the mother's struggle with alcoholism.