Furious Violet
A Novel

From the author of the bestselling phenomenon Dietland comes a razor-sharp, subversive thriller about motherhood, obsession, and the stories we tell ourselves to survive.Violet “West” Shelley has unwillingly spent her life in the spotlight as the only daughter of a legendary poet and feminist icon who died tragically young. Now, as the self-described “lowbrow” crime journalist approaches fifty—burned out, creatively blocked, and far older than her mother ever was—she retreats to her hometown in the Colorado mountains hometown to finish a long-overdue book about the “Crying Killer,” a notorious serial killer who sobs for his mother after committing his crimes.But what begins as a bid for solitude quickly spirals into something far more sinister. A stalker emerges—mysterious, relentless, with accusations disturbingly intimate: this invisible stranger insists that West is their long-lost mother, though West has never had children. As the threats escalate and her carefully defended privacy starts to shatter, West is drawn into a chilling psychological web where the boundaries between fiction and reality begin to collapse.Is she being watched? Hunted? Or is her own mind turning against her?Gripping, provocative, and laced with pitch-black humor, Furious Violet is a psychological thrill ride and a fierce exploration of mothers (real and imagined), fame, and the question of who can lay claim to women’s bodies of work--and their bodies themselves. Once again, Sarai Walker has delivered a subversively brilliant heroine unlike any other: damaged, defiant, and utterly unforgettable.