Westward Women

A Novel

De: Alice Martin

For fans of Emma Cline and Emily St. John Mandel, Westward Women is a hypnotic and hopeful debut—part fever dream, part dystopian road trip.

"An audacious first novel to set beside Margaret Atwood."—Joyce Carol Oates

It starts with an itch.

In homes across the country, women ages eighteen to thirty-five begin to slow down.

Tired. Blank. Restless.

Drawn to the Pacific Ocean like it’s calling them home. They abandon their lives—jobs, families, their very selves. And once they reach the West, they vanish forever.

At the center of the story are three young women caught in the pull of something unstoppable.

Aimee follows the trail of her missing best friend to a man called the Piper—known for leading infected women West.

Teenie, afflicted and unraveling, clings to a single memory as she looks out the window of the Piper’s van.

And Eve, a former journalist, is chasing the story that might just consume her.

Each on the edge of transformation. Drawn toward the unknown. In search of a way forward.

©2026 Alice Martin (P)2026 Macmillan Audio

Reseñas de la Crítica

"Alice Martin has written a warmly engaging parable about young women who become 'infected' with a mysterious virus that leads them to abandon their homes and travel westward—to uncertain destinies. Set in America in the waning years of the Vietnam War, ending in near-contemporary times, Westward Women has an air of prophecy enhanced by its close attentiveness to the intimate lives of girls and women. An audacious first novel to set beside Margaret Atwood's provocative first novel The Edible Woman."—Joyce Carol Oates

"This taut and shocking debut is part Western, part zombie thriller, and all cautionary tale about what happens when women’s bodies and desires are marginalized for too long. With twists you won’t see coming, Martin weaves an alternate history that’s only too relevant today."—Anna North, New York Times bestselling author of Outlawed

"A dazzlingly skilled novel. Clever and insidious, it gets under your skin like a virus and doesn’t leave until the last page."—Dana Schwartz, New York Times bestselling author of Anatomy: A Love Story