It was, Meredith had decided, precisely like sucking on a giant, whole-body Mentho-Lyptus cough drop, the way it cleared her out, head to toe.

It was a physical sensation, as real as cresting the first incline of a roller coaster, the momentum shift from ascending to descending.

She would say these things to herself because she liked the moment when she suddenly became uncertain that those things she was saying were in fact true, liked the way it made her feel unmoored, the hole of doubt that opened up inside her, and the wind that blew through that hole. Sometimes in the morning, while she waited for her brother to get out of the bathroom, Meredith Oliver would stand in front of her bureau mirror, lock eyes with her reflection, and say, “This is me. In this “daring” ( Kirkus Reviews, starred review), “sharp, and suspenseful” ( Publishers Weekly), “utterly captivating and achingly beautiful” (Kimberly McCreight, New York Times bestselling author of Reconstructing Amelia) novel, the critically acclaimed Susan Perabo asserts herself yet again as an engrossing storyteller and a master at cracking open the human psyche.

The Fall of Lisa Bellow is a beautiful illustration of how one family, broken by tragedy, finds healing and makes sense of the nonsensical. And as Claire grows more and more desperate to reach her, it becomes clear that Meredith is in a place where Claire can’t go, searching for Lisa Bellow where no one else can. Meredith’s mother, Claire, can see that her daughter is irreparably changed-she is here, but not.

But then the gunman orders Lisa Bellow to stand and come with him, leaving Meredith cowering in the wake of a life-altering near-tragedy.Īs the community stages vigils and search parties for Lisa Bellow, Meredith spends days shut away in her room, hiding in the dark landscape of her imagination. Lying there, Meredith is utterly convinced she will die. The breakout novel from the critically acclaimed author of the short story collections Who I Was Supposed to Be and Why They Run the Way They Do-when a middle school girl is abducted in broad daylight, a fellow student and witness to the crime copes with the tragedy in unforgettable ways.Ī masked man with a gun enters a sandwich shop in broad daylight, and Meredith Oliver finds herself ordered to the filthy floor, where she trembles face to face with her nemesis, Lisa Bellow-the most popular girl in her eighth grade class.

The Fall of Lisa Bellow by Susan Perabo