01/08/2024
Beaird shines in her impressive debut about a group of divorcées-to-be in 1950s Reno, Nev. After Lois Saunders asks for a divorce from Lawrence, her husband of nearly four years, she departs their home in Lake Forest, Ill., for the Golden Yarrow Ranch—a place designed for “good girls” to establish Nevada residency so they can secure a divorce under the state’s no-fault policy. While there, Lois becomes friendly with the ranch’s other guests and learns about their marital situations. Mary Elizabeth is fleeing an abusive husband, while Vera is recovering from heartache after her husband cheated on her with the maid. In Lois’s eyes, the most dazzling guest of all is Greer Lang, who claims to be escaping a violent marriage in New York City, and who inspires the women to step out of their staid lifestyles by indulging in boozy nights at a casino. But is Greer the person she claims to be? What if she’s actually leading Lois to her downfall? To find the answers, readers will eagerly follow Beaird’s skillful plotting and appealing characters all the way through the final page. This author is one to watch. Agent: Jamie Chambliss, Folio Literary. (Mar.)
A Most Anticipated Book (Good Housekeeping, Zibby Mag)
“Unforgettable.”
—Good Housekeeping
“This is the novel I've always wanted to read about divorce in midcentury America: the glamour and underbelly of Reno's divorce ranches, the support of female friendship, and the impossibility (and glorious possibilities) of starting over as a single woman. The Divorcées is a delicious literary page-turner from a fierce new voice.”
—Rebecca Makkai, New York Times bestselling author of I Have Some Questions for You and The Great Believers
“The Divorcées is gorgeously crafted, perfectly balanced, and full of complex, moving and vividly wrought characters. The sunshot pool at the Golden Yarrow, the searing desert heat, the dark glamour of the casinos will stay with me for a long time. Rowan Beaird writes with such ease and confidence that it's hard to believe this novel is her first. An excellent, deeply compelling read.”
—Lauren Groff, New York Times bestselling author of Matrix and Fates and Furies
“A stunning debut, Rowan Beaird’s The Divorcées is a glittering desert mirage behind which lurks a shocking web of secrets. Despite the new friendships and lives being built at the Golden Yarrow, each woman on the ranch harbors a truth they aren’t willing to share: that they’re playing a part and they’re willing to do whatever it takes to keep the fiction alive. Tense, dark, and richly layered, lovers of Patricia Highsmith will devour this compulsively readable, standout novel."
—Katy Hays, New York Times bestselling author of The Cloisters
“The Divorcées is my favorite kind of novel: a beautifully written, wholly immersive exploration of the performances women employ for survival. Set amid the heady glamour of Reno’s divorce ranches, The Divorcées mines what we will do for acceptance, belonging, and the privilege of carving out a life for ourselves. Rowan Beaird writes with both deep compassion and merciless precision—a fierce talent.”
—Katie Gutierrez, national bestselling author of More Than You’ll Ever Know
“The Divorcées, a sultry fever dream of a novel set on a Reno divorce ranch in the 1950s, should be read by a pool on a blisteringly hot day, preferably with a drink in hand. Its lush, perfectly wrought prose—and the secrets and deceptions at the center of the seductive plot—will unsettle you and keep you turning the pages. This book shimmers and startles on every page.”
—Whitney Scharer, author of The Age of Light
“If Patricia Highsmith and George Cukor teamed up to reimagine Thelma and Louise, it might look something like this smoldering, addictive, and beguiling novel of women on the verge. Whether they're on the verge of dissolution, liberation, or some fraught state in-between, Rowan Beaird captures their becoming in prose that thrums with an anxious and defiant eros. A knockout of a debut.”
—Christopher Castellani, author of Leading Men
“The women of The Divorcées captivated me: drenched in desert light, searching for themselves in every possible mirror. Their relationships to one another, gorgeously rendered, have an intensity fueled by self-discovery—these are connections full of deep understanding, shocking deception, devastating betrayal, and real love. Beaird is a wondrous new talent who has given us an unforgettable, lushly assured novel.”
—Clare Beams, author of The Illness Lesson
“The alluring and fascinating backdrop of a divorce ranch for women in the '50s is reason enough to dive into Rowan Beaird’s stunning debut novel, The Divorcees, but that is just the beginning. This beautifully crafted, suspenseful journey of secrets and intrigue will hold readers spellbound.”
—Jill McCorkle, New York Times bestselling author of Hieroglyphics and Life After Life
02/01/2024
DEBUT Beaird's first novel is a twisty tale about learning to take responsibility for one's own life. In the 1950s, Lois escapes a short and loveless marriage in Chicago by staying on a "divorce ranch" for six weeks to establish residency in Reno, NV, a city where unhappiness is legal grounds for divorce. (In most states at the time, divorce was only justified by abandonment or adultery.) Lois had sleepwalked into marriage after an unloving childhood and her mother's death, and at Nevada's Golden Yarrow Ranch, Lois remains passive and socially awkward, until the arrival of glamorous and overbearing Greer. The women staying at the ranch travel nightly to bars and casinos in Reno, and Greer pushes them toward increasingly drunken and wild behavior. Lois is thrilled at Greer's attention and proud to help her fight off a stalking husband; then she embraces Greer's scheme to steal money from a casino and is barely able to save herself from Greer's resulting betrayal. In a satisfying denouement, Lois overcomes her passivity and sets out on her own, earning a steady if unglamourous income and working toward a self-actualized future as a makeup artist. VERDICT The history of "divorce ranches" in the United States is fascinating as depicted in this novel, and Lois's growing independence is compelling. A good choice for readers and book groups interested in 20th-century historical fiction that deals with women's issues.—Jan Marry
2023-12-16
At a divorce ranch in the 1950s, a lonely woman in her early 20s finds a beautiful, mysterious friend.
Lois Saunders’ trip from Lake Forest, Illinois, to Reno, Nevada, is the first step in her liberation from her husband and her father, both of whom infantilize her. At the Golden Yarrow, she will be part of a small group of women waiting out the six weeks of residency required for a divorce. “Like the girls from school, they all have the fresh, clear skin that signifies not just money, but wealth—Lois’s lesser lineage apparent in the bumps prickling her forehead, the thick hair on her forearms.” Though she lies about her background to impress them, the girls close ranks. Her father has told the director not to let her leave the ranch, so she doesn’t go with them on their nightly outings to bars and casinos, and she has no urge to join their daily trail rides. Filled with self-doubt verging on self-loathing, Lois is surprised when a glamorous new guest—who arrives with a huge bruise on her face and goes into seclusion for several days—emerges to choose her, Lois, as her new best friend. Greer Lang wears men’s oxford shirts and exudes such confidence that the director’s daughters wonder if she’s a princess. Her approval unlocks access to the group for Lois, who’s soon tossing back cocktails at the casino and feeling as if she’s becoming a different person. But just as the lizard curled on her windowsill turns out to be an illusion, a shadow, things are not what they seem. Though it’s filled with colorful imagery, dark green dresses and burgundy lips, Beaird’s debut has the hypnotic pacing and dramatic ambience of an old black-and-white film. Her research about the divorce-ranch phenomenon and its period expresses itself in myriad small, compelling details, winking like the stones on the engagement rings the girls toss into the river after their court dates—though Lois’ ring has a different fate.
A transporting psychological novel of friendship and betrayal, with the moody period feel of a Hitchcock film.