Fiction Book Club

The Strange Case of Jane O.: A Novel


Karen Thompson Walker

FROM THE BOOK JACKET: In this spellbinding and provocative novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Age of Miracles, a young mother is struck by sudden and puzzling psychological symptoms that illuminate the mysterious dimensions of the human mind—and of love.

A year after her child is born, Jane suffers a series of strange episodes: amnesia, premonitions, hallucinations, and an inexplicable sense of dread. Three days after her first visit to a psychiatrist, Jane suddenly goes missing. A day later she is found unconscious in Brooklyn's Prospect Park, in the midst of what seems to be an episode of dissociative fugue; when she comes to, she has no memory of what has happened to her.

Are Jane's strange experiences the result of being overwhelmed by motherhood, or are they manifestations of a long-buried trauma from her past? Why is she having visions of a young man who died twenty years ago and who warns her of a disaster ahead? Jane's symptoms lead her psychiatrist ever deeper into the farthest reaches of her mind and cause him to question everything he thinks he knows about so-called reality--including events in his own life.

Karen Thompson Walker's profound and beautifully written novel is both a speculative mystery about memory, identity, and fate and a mesmerizing literary puzzle about the bonds of love--between mother and child, between a man and a woman, and among those we've lost but who may still be among us.

Visit Karen Thompson Walker Store on AmazonABOUT THE AUTHOR: Karen Thompson Walker's New York Times bestseller The Age of Miracles has been translated into twenty-nine languages and was named one of the best books of the year by People, O: The Oprah Magazine, and Financial Times, among other publications. Her second novel, The Dreamers, was a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice and was named one of the best books of the year by Glamour, Real Simple, and Good Housekeeping. Born and raised in San Diego, Walker is a graduate of UCLA and the Columbia MFA program. She is an associate professor of creative writing and lives with her husband, the novelist Casey Walker, and their two daughters in Portland, Oregon.


Read this book and join over 300,000 other readers with a free Library Online Book Club subscription

Subscribe
  Catalog
Online Book Clubs
  • Online Book Clubs is a fun way to discover and read books on your web browser, smartphone or tablet.
  • Subscribe to the clubs for free to get access to the first few chapters of a new book. Receive a 5-minute read daily for 5 days.
  • Author Buzz and Kids Buzz: exclusive weekly service featuring 4-5 authors, up close and personal. Authors offer free signed copies of their books and dozens of other free giveaways every week.


Start reading today

What our readers think...

Join an online "Book Club" and start receiving sample chapters from popular books in your daily email. Every day, Monday through Friday, we'll send you a portion of a book that takes only five minutes to read. Each Monday we begin a new book and by Friday you will have the chance to read 2 or 3 chapters, enough to know if it's a book you want to finish. You can read a wide variety of books including fiction, nonfiction, romance, business, teen and mystery books. Just give us your email address and five minutes a day, and we'll give you an exciting world of reading.