02509cam a2200349 i 4500 362074182 TxAuBib 20181029120000.0 180103s2018||||||||||||||||||||||||eng|u 2017057600 9780374164836 0374164835 (OCoLC)1019839442 TxAuBib rda Kiesling, Lydia. The Golden State / Lydia Kiesling. First edition. New York : MCD/Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018. 292 pages ; 22 cm. txt rdacontent n rdamedia nc rdacarrier In Lydia Kiesling’s razor-sharp debut novel, The Golden State, we accompany Daphne, a young mother on the edge of a breakdown, as she flees her sensible but strained life in San Francisco for the high desert of Altavista with her toddler, Honey. Bucking under the weight of being a single parent―her Turkish husband is unable to return to the United States because of a “processing error”―Daphne takes refuge in a mobile home left to her by her grandparents in hopes that the quiet will bring clarity. But clarity proves elusive. Over the next ten days Daphne is anxious, she behaves a little erratically, she drinks too much. She wanders the town looking for anyone and anything to punctuate the long hours alone with the baby. Among others, she meets Cindy, a neighbor who is active in a secessionist movement, and befriends the elderly Alice, who has traveled to Altavista as she approaches the end of her life. When her relationships with these women culminate in a dangerous standoff, Daphne must reconcile her inner narrative with the reality of a deeply divided world. Keenly observed, bristling with humor, and set against the beauty of a little-known part of California, The Golden State is about class and cultural breakdowns, and desperate attempts to bridge old and new worlds. But more than anything, it is about motherhood: its voracious worry, frequent tedium, and enthralling, wondrous love. 20181029. Mothers and daughters California San Francisco Bay Area Fiction. Desertion and non-support Fiction. Moving, Household California, Northern Fiction. California, Northern Rural conditions Fiction. Domestic fiction. Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. T3L