Omega Farm - by Martha McPhee (Paperback)

About the Book

"A long-awaited memoir from an award-winning novelist-a candid, riveting account of her complicated, bohemian childhood and her return home to care for her ailing mother. In March 2020, Martha McPhee, her husband, and their two almost-grown children set out for her childhood home in New Jersey, where she finds herself grappling simultaneously with a mother slipping into severe dementia and a house that's been neglected of late. As Martha works to manage her mother's care and the sprawling, ramshackle property-a broken septic system, invasive bamboo, dying ash trees-she is pulled back into her childhood, almost against her will. Martha grew up at Omega Farm with her four sisters, five stepsiblings, mother, and stepfather, in a house filled with art, people, and the kind of chaos that was sometimes benevolent, sometimes more sinister. Caring for her mother and her children, struggling to mend the forest, the past relentlessly asserts itself-even as Martha's mother, the person she might share her memories with or even try to hold to account, no longer knows who Martha is. A masterful exploration of a complicated family legacy and a powerful story of environmental and personal repair, Omega Farm is a testament to hope in the face of suffering, and a courageous tale about how returning home can offer a new way to understand the past"--

Book Synopsis

*A New Yorker and Vogue Best Book of 2023* "Compelling... [McPhee] positions herself neither as victim nor saint but as someone who, she says, only wants to be good." --The Washington Post A moving memoir from an award-winning novelist--a riveting account of her complicated, bohemian childhood and her return home to care for her ailing mother.In March 2020, Martha McPhee, her husband, and their two children set out for her childhood home in New Jersey, where she finds herself grappling simultaneously with a mother slipping into severe dementia and a house that's fallen into neglect. As Martha works to manage her mother's care and the sprawling, ramshackle property--a broken septic system, invasive bamboo, dying ash trees--she is swept back, unwillingly, into memories of her fraught, dysfunctional childhood. In this masterful exploration of a complicated family legacy, McPhee "makes no effort to spare her own flaws even as she searches for the roots of her mature turmoil in the shortcomings of adults who failed in the fundamental task of protecting her younger self" (BookPage). Omega Farm is an "expansive" (New Yorker) testament to hope in the face of suffering, and a courageous tale about how returning home can offer a new way to understand the past.

Review Quotes

"Compelling...McPhee's prose is steady, her tone thoughtful. She examines events of her past from all angles. She is amazingly generous...[Her] carefulness adds to her credibility; she positions herself neither as victim nor saint but as someone who, she says, only wants to be good."-Washington Post "Expansive... [McPhee] embarks upon a series of projects-including tending to the understory of the land's forest-that lead her to examine the stories that sit behind her own ideas of family and sense of self."-New Yorker "McPhee is an efficient, graceful writer, who makes no effort to spare her own flaws even as she searches for the roots of her mature turmoil in the shortcomings of adults who failed in the fundamental task of protecting her younger self."-Bookpage "Omega Farm is a moving memoir and an inspiring testament to forgiveness and hope."-Shelf Awareness

About the Author

Martha McPhee is the author of the novels An Elegant Woman, Bright Angel Time, Gorgeous Lies, L'America, and Dear Money. She is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts grant and a fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation. Gorgeous Lies was a finalist for the National Book Award. She teaches fiction at Hofstra University and lives in New York City.