The Catch

Poet Daley-Ward (Bone) makes her fiction debut with an engrossing and off-kilter tale of twin sisters and their mother, a Black woman who left them when they were infants in 1995 London. Clara and Dempsey were adopted by different families after a dead body found on the banks of the Thames was identified as their mother, Serene (their father’s identity was unknown). Now, at 30, Clara is a successful novelist who drinks too much and has meaningless sex, while Dempsey is a reclusive data entry worker who relies on an unorthodox life coach. When Clara sees a woman who looks just like the Serene she knows from photos, she’s convinced the woman is her and Dempsey’s mother, but there’s one catch: the stranger appears to be 30, the age Serena was when she disappeared. Clara and the stranger fall into an intriguing push-pull relationship; Clara hopes to take care of her, but she says Clara is the one who “seem[s] a little lost.” When Clara claims to Dempsey that their mother has reappeared, Dempsey worries that the woman is an opportunistic imposter. In chapters from the perspective of aspiring writer Serene in 1995, the reader gains insight into the reasons behind her departure. The dreamy novel is propelled by searching questions about how to be a mother and how to find fulfillment. It’s a singular family drama. Agent: Marya Spence, Janklow & Nesbit Assoc. (June)