Bug Hollow

The Samuelson family stumbles through the extremes of love and loss in the intriguing if undercooked sixth novel from Huneven (Search). It begins in 1970s Northern California, when Ellis, a recent high school graduate, goes missing. He eventually returns, having taken a road trip with friends, but the episode’s painful impact on his family proves to be a prelude for later grief. After Ellis accidentally drowns during his first semester at college, the tragedy serves as a catalyst for the other characters’ life-altering decisions. Julia, Ellis’s pregnant girlfriend, struggles to decide whether to take the pregnancy to term before arranging to have Ellis’s parents adopt the baby, named Eva. Ellis’s mother, Sybil, an elementary school teacher, drinks heavily and puts her work before her two younger daughters, overachieving Katie and artistic Sally, while their father, an architect, struggles to find a way forward. Later sections focus on the sisters in adulthood, as Katie leaves home to become a doctor while Sally helps raise Eva, now a young woman who tries to make sense of her family. Huneven succeeds at sketching the ways a family is shaped by trauma, but she maintains a fuzzy distance from the characters while shuttling through time, as if flipping through a yellowed photo album. This one leaves readers wanting more. Agent: Brettne Bloom, Book Group. (June)