Imagine Me Gone

At the heart of the family in this wrenching novel is a tragedy: the patriarch, John, suffering from severe depression, kills himself when his three children are young. Those who survive him–his children, Michael, Alec, and Celia; and his wife, Margaret–spend the rest of their lives with this loss as the centerpiece of their interactions and ambitions. To everyone’s frustration and horror, eldest sibling Michael seems to be following in John’s footsteps. When Michael’s over-medicated lifestyle becomes unsustainable, the family conspires to help him start anew–while on some level understanding all along that his fate may already be sealed.

Each family member in Imagine Me Gone is flawed and fumbling; each is relentlessly searching even when the objective is unclear. Michael’s witty, wry observations underscore the often absurd attempts of the family to come together and heal. Haslett loves these characters: every sentence shows it. The story he spins here is so richly wrinkled that readers may find themselves engaged to a point of near-anger, hopelessly wishing for a different ending even though the ending has been clear from page one.