Ripe

(Paperback)

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Description

A year into her dream job at a cutthroat Silicon Valley startup, Cassie is trapped in a corporate nightmare. Between the long hours, toxic bosses and unethical projects, she struggles to reconcile the glittering promise of a city where obscene wealth lives alongside abject poverty. Ivy League grads complain about the snack selection from a conference room with a view of houseless people bathing in the bay. Startup burnouts leap into the paths of commuter trains and men literally set themselves on fire in the streets.

Though isolated, Cassie is never alone. From her earliest memory, the black hole has been her constant companion. It feeds on her depression and anxiety, its size changing in relation to her distress. The black hole watches, but it also waits. Its relentless pull draws Cassie ever closer as the world around her unravels.

When her CEO's demands cross an illegal line and her personal life spirals towards a bleak precipice, Cassie must decide whether the tempting fruits of Silicon Valley are worth the pain, or succumb to the black hole.

'Holy shit, this book wrecked me!' Samantha Irby, New York Times bestselling author of Wow, No Thank You

'Ripe is brilliant a distinctive, sharp, engrossing window into late-stage capitalism. My face melted into this book' Emily Austin, author of Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead

'Ripe is a triumph blade-sharp and unflinching. It walks a darkly gorgeous tightrope between the bitter and beautiful with skill that takes your breath away' Sophie Mackintosh, author of The Water Cure

'Reading this book felt like pressing repeatedly on a bruise; the most pleasurable kind of pain...Sarah Rose Etter is truly one hell of a writer' Kristen Arnett, author of Mostly Dead Things

'Etter continues to push the boundaries of her imagination...and ours' Melissa Broder, author of The Pisces and Milk Fed

Reviews

This surreal book makes images as real as anything else - Bustle (Most Anticipated Books Of Spring & Summer 2023) * Bustle *
Sarah Rose Etter's Ripe has the most exquisitely described dread I've read in ages. I couldn't put this book down. Totally haunting and propulsive -- Halle Butler
Ripe is a triumph - blade sharpe and unflinching. It walks a darkly gorgeous tightrope between the bitter and beautiful with skill that takes your breath away -- Sophie Mackintosh
Ripe is brilliant - a distinctive, sharp, engrossing window into late-stage capitatlism. My face melted into this book -- Emily Austin
Holy Shit, this book wrecked me! -- Samantha Irby

Author Bio

Sarah Rose Etter is the author of the chapbook Tongue Party and The Book of X, winner of a Shirley Jackson Award for Best Novel. Her work has appeared in Time, Guernica, BOMB, The Bennington Review, The Cut, VICE, and elsewhere. She earned her MFA in fiction from Rosemont College. She lives in Los Angeles.