

“ lies somewhere between psychological thriller, scientific theory and coming-of-age story, a seemingly untenable combination. “Elegantly and humorously orchestrated.Knitting together Rosemary’s at times poignant, at times hilarious scraps of uncovered memories, Fowler creates a fantastical tale of raw, animalistic love.”- O, The Oprah Magazine We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves is Fowler at her best, mixing cerebral and emotional appeal together in an utterly captivating manner.”- The Seattle Times But the heart of the novel-and it has a big, warm, loudly beating heart throughout-is in its gradually pieced-together tale of family togetherness, disruption and reconciliation. Cognitive, language and memory skills all come into playful question. “Fowler’s interests here are in what sets humans apart from their fellow primates. Monkeyshines aside, this is a story of Everyfamily in which loss engraves relationships, truth is a soulful stalker and coming-of-age means facing down the mirror, recognizing the shape-shifting notion of self.”-Barbara Kingsolver, The New York Times Book Review fresh diction and madcap plot bend the tone toward comedy, but it never mislays its solemn raison d’être. “A novel so readably juicy and surreptitiously smart, it deserves all the attention it can get. Praise for We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves “A gripping, big-hearted book.through the tender voice of her protagonist, Fowler has a lot to say about family, memory, language, science, and indeed the question of what constitutes a human being.”-Khaled Hosseini In We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, Karen Joy Fowler weaves her most accomplished work to date-a tale of loving but fallible people whose well-intentioned actions lead to heartbreaking consequences. Then, something happened, and Rosemary wrapped herself in silence.

But until Fern’s expulsion.she was my twin, my funhouse mirror, my whirlwind other half and I loved her as a sister.” As a child, Rosemary never stopped talking.

“I tell you Fern was a chimp and already you aren’t thinking of her as my sister. “I was raised with a chimpanzee,” she explains. Meet the Cooke family: Mother and Dad, brother Lowell, sister Fern, and Rosemary, who begins her story in the middle. The New York Times bestselling author of The Jane Austen Book Club introduces a middle-class American family that is ordinary in every way but one in this novel that won the PEN/Faulkner Award and was a finalist for the Man Booker Prize.
