A troubled young man’s bright future takes a strange turn when his mother commits murder in this “riveting and disturbing novel” of 1990s Washington State ( The Guardian ). A Guardian and San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of 2016. Joseph March, a twenty-one-year-old working-class kid from Seattle, is on top of the world. He has just graduated college and his limitless future beckons. But Joe’s life suddenly implodes when he starts to suffer from the symptoms of bipolar disorder. Then, not long after, his mother kills a man she’s never met with a hammer. Joe moves to White Pine, Washington, where his mother is serving time and his father has set up house. Followed there by his girlfriend, Tess Wolff, Joe’s life falls into a daily rhythm of prison visits followed by beer and pizza at a local bar. Meanwhile, Joe’s mother, Anne-Marie, is gradually becoming a local heroine. Many see her crime as a furious, exasperated act of righteous rebellion. Tess, too, has fallen under her spell. Spurred on by Anne-Marie’s example, Tess enlists Joe in a secret, violent plan that will forever change their lives. Shelter in Place is a stylish novel about the hereditary nature of mental illness, the fleeting intensity of youth, the obligations of family, and the dramatic consequences of love. A  Guardian  Best Book of 2016 A  San Francisco Chronicle  Best Book of 2016 Un  Revue America  Meilleur Livre de l’Année  “There’s something truly exhilarating about reading a novel that’s so audaciously original, so inventive and let’s be honest, so sort of weird that you want to put it in the hands of just about everyone you know. And that’s a perfect description of Alexander Maksik’s stunningly unsettling third novel,  Shelter in Place .”— San Francisco Chronicle “Alexander Maksik’s riveting and disturbing novel  Shelter in Place  is a totally original exploration of mental illness, sexual politics, family and violence.”— Guardian “Maksik perfectly captures the weight of mental illness, the ache of longing and uncertainty, and the complexity of human relationships. Highly recommended.”— Library Journal “Alexander Maksik covers fresh ground with each new work. In poetic bursts…he captures [his characters’] inner convulsions while exploring the passions that can drive, and destroy, us.”— Vanity Fair “Impressive . . . A novel of considerable power.”— Times Literary Supplement  “A riveting, darkly beautiful novel . . . poised to be one of the big books of the season – the kind of sweeping story that encompasses so much of what it is to be human.”— Departures  “Sensual, musical . . .  Shelter in Place  is as unquestionably brilliant as it is painful; a rare meditation on mania, depression, and the rage of youth.”— Huffington Post “[A] striking narrative. . . Maksik’s Joe March is a man for today as much as Ishmael and Stephen were for Melville’s and Joyce’s days.”— Shelf Awareness “An incredibly courageous novel that delves deeply into issues of love, gender, violence and mental illness.”— Publishers Weekly “Maksik is one of the most exacting and daring writers we have . . . from the first sentence there’s no turning away from this story.”— Literary Hub “Intense and . . . mesmerizing.”— Booklist “[A] scorching third novel. Maksik [delivers] a portrait of bipolar disorder…that is honest and devastating.”— Publishers Weekly “Alexander Maksik is a sorcerer of the first order, and  Shelter in Place  is a sharp, dark, jagged music conjured out of poetry, pain and ecstatic bursts of beauty. This is a powerful book.”— Lauren Groff, author   of  Fates and Furies  and  Arcadia “An unsettling and beautiful exploration of mental illness, love, violence, family and sexual politics. Maksik’s artful story outruns all sorts of received ideas and cliched narratives, and slips into deeply original territory. You’ll be haunted by it in the best possible way.”— Katie Roiphe, author   of   The Violet Hour  and  In Praise of Messy Lives “Unsettling and honest, a remarkably insightful portrait of mental illness,  Shelter in Place  is elegiac, savage and mournful, a beautifully written novel about the echoes of our actions, of love and its consequences.”— Aminatta Forna, author   of   The Hired Man  and  The Memory of Love “Shelter In Place  is a love story like none I’ve ever read before. Lust, longing, betrayal, revenge—it’s all here, but only when and where you least expect it. Densely ruminative, and bracingly unromantic, the ballad of Tess, Joe, and his parents tests the brutal outer-limits of patriarchy, the bleak realities of untreated mental illness, and the nature of loyalty in a world where every woman is out for herself. And every man, as well.”— Kate Bolick, author   of   Spinster: Making a Life of One’s Own “Shelter in Place  is a magnificent novel. Alexander Maksik charts the legacy of violence and the limits of justice with grace and power.”— Anthony Marra, author   of  A Constellation of Vital Phenomena  and  The Tsar of Love and