Ash

A volcanic eruption forces a rural veterinarian to cut short her maternity leave in the uneven debut novel from New Zealand poet Wallace. With ashfall covering the streets of the unnamed narrator’s small town, day cares close, office workers report from home, and grocery store shelves stand empty. But the natural disaster is only one battle among many for the narrator, a working mother who struggles with crying children, an inattentive husband, mountains of laundry, and the biases of her male coworkers. When a position opens at her midsize veterinary practice, she alone advocates on behalf of a younger female colleague. One of her children develops a respiratory illness from the thick, gray ash, which makes “everything more urgent.” Despite the intense subject matter, the plot slips into clichés, such as the depiction of a sexist male colleague. Still, the narrator offers impactful reflections on motherhood, which for her feels “like shattering your body into pieces, gluing them back together so the light shines through the seams, then flooding it with greenery, your whole insides a garden fit to burst.” The result is a somewhat pedestrian story punctuated by distinctive bursts of lyricism. (May)