The Butterfly Effect: A Novel

(Paperback)

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

Sarah Haywood's The Cactus meets Graeme Simsion's The Rosie Project in this heartwarming tale of an introvert, her lack of social conduct and empirical data-driven approach to people and relationships. The monarch. The glasswing. The red admiral. These are the names of some of Greta Oto's closest friends. As an entomologist who specializes in butterflies, Greta far prefers the company of bugs to humans, with the exception of her twin brother, Danny, though they've recently had a falling out. So she lands a research gig in the rainforest and leaves it all behind. But when Greta learns that Danny has suffered an aneurysm and is now hospitalized, she abandons her research and hurries home to the middle of nowhere America to be there for her brother. But there's only so much she can do, and unfortunately just like insects, humans don't stay cooped up in their hives either-they buzz about and...socialize. Coming home means confronting all that she left behind, including her lousy soon-to-be sister-in-law, her estranged mother, and her ex-boyfriend Brandon who has conveniently found a new non-lab-exclusive partner with shiny hair, perfect teeth, and can actually remember the names of the people she meets right away. Being that Brandon runs the only butterfly conservatory in town, and her dissertation is now in jeopardy, taking that job, being back home, it's all creating chaos of Greta's perfectly catalogued and compartmentalized world. Glasswings is a warm, uplifting story about the behavior of bugs (and people), how they can be altered by high-pressure climates, confused by breakdowns in communication, and most importantly, how they can rehabilitate themselves and each other.

Reviews

Praise for The Butterfly Effect:
A warm, winning debut from a talented new Midwestern voice.
J. Ryan Stradal, New York Times bestselling author of Kitchens of the Great Midwest

Delightfully off-kilter[Lovably-flawed]Gretas comically critical point of view interrogates midwestern norms and gendered stereotypes in a story that explores the legacy of familial dysfunction.Come for the butterflies, and stay for Mans McKenny's acerbic authorial eye which examinesthe complexities of the Midwest and its quiet dramas.
Rachel Yoder, award-winning author of Nightbitch

"a lovably grumpy and unfiltered heroine. As a reader, youll undergo your own metamorphosis and realize how much you needed this story."
Faith Salie, Emmy-winning contributor to CBS News Sunday Morning and author of Approval Junkie

A well-written story with an interesting character in Greta.
Red Carpet Crash

Author Bio

Rachel Mans McKenny is a Presidential Award-winning journalist, and a graduate of the Pennsylvania Governor's School for the Arts. Her work has been published in The New York Times, Electric Literature, The Rumpus, Scary Mommy, McSweeney's, and other outlets. She's currently working with This American Life to help produce a story about a controversy in her small Iowa town. Glasswings is her first novel.