'Ann-Marie MacDonald captures the dark hilarity of parenthood like nobody else. I gulped down Adult Onset in a single day.' EMMA DONOGHUE, author of ROOM

'A complex, troubling novel that cuts with surgical precision into the sinew and muscle of family life.' - SARAH WATERS

Mary Rose MacKinnon has agreed to be a stay-at-home mother while her partner's career takes centre stage. As she balances childcare with the relentless needs of her own ageing parents, into the hilarities of full-on domesticity seeps a feeling of dread. Do others notice the dents in the expensive refrigerator? How did those scissors wind up in her toddler's hands?

When a flare-up of a forgotten childhood illness compels her to rethink her own upbringing, Mary Rose's world threatens to unravel and the spectre of violence raises its head.

With biting humour and unerring emotional accuracy, Adult Onset explores the pleasures and pressures of family bonds, so powerful and yet so easily twisted and broken.

About the Author
Ann-Marie MacDonald is a bestselling, award-winning novelist, playwright, actor and broadcaster. She lives in Toronto with her partner and their two children.

Reviews
Beautifully rendered... frank and acidly funny... It's a large-hearted, resonant novel, filled with an interiority that opens out - a generous work. * Guardian *
Sensitive and unmistakeably heartfelt * Sunday Times *
Definitely recommended * Daily Mail *
A complex, troubling novel that cuts with surgical precision into the sinew and muscle of family life. * Sarah Waters, author of The Paying Guests *
Big, troubling and brave. * The New York Times *
Ann-Marie MacDonald captures the dark hilarity of parenthood like nobody else. I gulped down Adult Onset in a single day. * Emma Donoghue, author of Room *
...explores the question of parental abuse and its origins with uncommon courage. * Now magazine, Canada *
She has again delivered a masterpiece. * Michelle Dean, The Globe and Mail *
A lively, moving, and often funny story that has the potential to help usher in a new era of honest literary depictions of families in all their permutations. * The Walrus *
. . . a novel impossible to put down once begun. . . . the novel is superb, a fine blending of fact and fiction, of remembered incident and forgotten history, a wonderfully written treatise on the power of the past to impinge on the present. * Nancy Schiefer, The London Free Press, Canada *
Ms. MacDonald strikes just the right tone as she exposes the brutal undercurrents of domestic life. * New York Times *
. . . an intricate, gripping novel that is also a master class in turning the personal into the universal through art. * Brian Bethune, Maclean's Canada *
Many of us will see ourselves in the profound discomfort MacDonald has conjured... the book is an absolute triumph of terrifying authenticity. * National Post *
Suspense builds; surely, horror awaits. . . . Macdonald's book remains spellbinding throughout. It is impossible to forget. * Paul Gessell, Quill & Quire *
Remarkable...an engrossing, disturbing and layered tale. * Chicago Tribune on The Way the Crow Flies *
[MacDonald's] prose...is always right and true, clean and penetrating. * Winnipeg Free Press on The Way The Crow Flies *
One of the finest novels I've read in a long, long time. * The Washington Post on The Way The Crow Flies *
MacDonald is a stunningly good writer . . . The Way the Crow Flies . . . secures for MacDonald a place, forever, in Canadian literature. * Calgary Herald *
Macdonald is excellent at conversation - the phonecalls between Mary Rose and her mother are superb in their accuracy * Independent on Sunday *



Book Information
ISBN 9781473610156
Author Ann-Marie MacDonald
Format Paperback
Page Count 400
Imprint Sceptre
Publisher Hodder & Stoughton
Weight(grams) 260g
Dimensions(mm) 196mm * 128mm * 30mm