Fruit of the Dead

A "superb...refreshing" (The New York Times Book Review) reimagining of the myth of Persephone and Demeter set on a lush private island, exploring themes of addiction and sex, family, independence, and who holds the power in a modern underworld. Camp counselor Cory Ansel, eighteen and aimless, afraid to face her high-strung single mother´s disappointment, is no longer sure where home is when the father of one of her campers offers an alternative. The CEO of a pharmaceutical company, Rolo Picazo is wealthy, divorced, and magnetic. He is also intoxicated by Cory. When Rolo offers her a job, Cory quiets an internal warning and allows herself to be ferried to his private island. Plied with luxury and the opiates manufactured by his company, she tells herself she´s in charge. Her mother, Emer, head of a teetering agricultural NGO, senses otherwise. With her daughter seemingly vanished, Emer crosses land and sea to heed a cry for help that only she can hear. Alternating between the two women´s perspectives, Fruit of the Dead incorporates its mythic inspiration with a light touch and devastating precision. The result is a tale that explores love, control, obliteration, and America´s late-capitalist mythos. Lyon´s reinvention of Persephone and Demeter´s story makes for a haunting, electric novel that readers will not soon forget.