The author of the “ethereal and brutally realistic” (The New York Times) Tuesday Nights in 1980 returns with a highly anticipated new novel exploring what it means to be a woman in her many forms—daughter, friend, partner, lover, and mother.
Emily writes for women’s catalogs for a living, but she’d rather be writing books. She has a handsome photographer boyfriend, but she actively wonders how and when they will eventually hurt each other. Her best work friend Megan is her lifeline, until Megan is abruptly laid off. When her world is further upended by an unplanned pregnancy, Emily is forced to make tough decisions that will change her life forever.
What will she sacrifice from her old life to make room for a new one? What fires will she be forced to extinguish, and which will keep burning? Old Flame is a story about the essential—and often existential—choices that define a woman’s life at every level, from which dress to wear to when to have a child to how to be in the world.
Genre: Literary Fiction
Emily writes for women’s catalogs for a living, but she’d rather be writing books. She has a handsome photographer boyfriend, but she actively wonders how and when they will eventually hurt each other. Her best work friend Megan is her lifeline, until Megan is abruptly laid off. When her world is further upended by an unplanned pregnancy, Emily is forced to make tough decisions that will change her life forever.
What will she sacrifice from her old life to make room for a new one? What fires will she be forced to extinguish, and which will keep burning? Old Flame is a story about the essential—and often existential—choices that define a woman’s life at every level, from which dress to wear to when to have a child to how to be in the world.
Genre: Literary Fiction
Praise for this book
"Old Flame asks all the important questions: What if women are people? What if relinquishment of the Self is a good thing? How does a person make good on the past while charting a future? What does it mean to no longer be young?" - Elisa Albert
"Molly Prentiss is a deeply empathic noticer who never fails to articulate the brutal, beautiful unseen elements of life. The kind of writing that elicits that involuntary kind of moan of recognition." - Marie-Helene Bertino
"Old Flame is amazing--a warmhearted and luminous page-turner about desire, time, love, parenthood, work, and art in women's lives. What a woman invents of herself, what the world demands she be, and the stories she tells to find her many selves across a lifetime are considered with both the scorching verve of Elena Ferrante and the frank humor of Maria Semple. This unforgettable book is a love letter to love itself, to how hard and wonderful life is, and to finding home, in all its thrilling, changing forms, ever mysterious and known." - Sophie McManus
"A stylish and sharp look at one woman's attempt to balance the competing interests of her work and life. A balm for anyone overwhelmed with contradictory desires." - Kiley Reid
"Molly Prentiss is a deeply empathic noticer who never fails to articulate the brutal, beautiful unseen elements of life. The kind of writing that elicits that involuntary kind of moan of recognition." - Marie-Helene Bertino
"Old Flame is amazing--a warmhearted and luminous page-turner about desire, time, love, parenthood, work, and art in women's lives. What a woman invents of herself, what the world demands she be, and the stories she tells to find her many selves across a lifetime are considered with both the scorching verve of Elena Ferrante and the frank humor of Maria Semple. This unforgettable book is a love letter to love itself, to how hard and wonderful life is, and to finding home, in all its thrilling, changing forms, ever mysterious and known." - Sophie McManus
"A stylish and sharp look at one woman's attempt to balance the competing interests of her work and life. A balm for anyone overwhelmed with contradictory desires." - Kiley Reid
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