Lone Women

A Novel

By: Victor LaValle

Narrated by: Joniece Abbott-Pratt

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Blue skies, empty land—and enough wide-open space to hide a horrifying secret. A woman with a past, a mysterious trunk, a town on the edge of nowhere, and an “absorbing, powerful” (BuzzFeed) new vision of the American West, from the award-winning author of The Changeling.

“Propulsive . . . LaValle combines chills with deep insights into our country’s divides.”—Los Angeles Times

ONE OF BOOKPAGE'S TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • FINALIST FOR THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE AND LOCUS AWARD • LONGLISTED FOR THE MARK TWAIN AMERICAN VOICE IN LITERATURE AWARD

A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, Time, NPR, Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, Esquire, Vulture, Paste, Tordotcom, Book Riot, Polygon, Chicago Public Library, Kirkus Reviews, Library Journal

Adelaide Henry carries an enormous steamer trunk with her wherever she goes. It’s locked at all times. Because when the trunk opens, people around Adelaide start to disappear.

The year is 1915, and Adelaide is in trouble. Her secret sin killed her parents, forcing her to flee California in a hellfire rush and make her way to Montana as a homesteader. Dragging the trunk with her at every stop, she will become one of the “lone women” taking advantage of the government’s offer of free land for those who can tame it—except that Adelaide isn’t alone. And the secret she’s tried so desperately to lock away might be the only thing that will help her survive the harsh territory.

Crafted by a modern master of magical suspense, Lone Women blends shimmering prose, an unforgettable cast of adventurers who find horror and sisterhood in a brutal landscape, and a portrait of early-twentieth-century America like you’ve never seen. And at its heart is the gripping story of a woman desperate to bury her past—or redeem it.

©2023 Victor LaValle (P)2023 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“Enthralling . . . The combination of LaValle’s agile prose, the velocity of the narrative and the pleasure of upended expectations makes this book almost impossible to put down . . . Lone Women deftly weaves history, horror, suspense and the perspectives of those rarely recorded in the West.”—The New York Times

“Propulsive [with] a fast-paced plot—though I found myself gripped just as much by Adelaide’s defiant, glorious stubbornness and guarded wit. Lone Women combines elements of Western fiction, horror and magical realism, while featuring queer, POC characters inventing lives for themselves in the last years of the American frontier. It’s impossible to categorize and impossible to put down.”—NPR, “Books We Love”

“LaValle populates his Western with an array of grotesques, killers, hypocrites, and sinners, but he also makes room for diversity that the genre has too long suppressed. It’s a corrective to the founding myth of America, a book filled with bloodshed and pain, but always holding out for the hope of a happy ending.”—Esquire, “Best Horror Books of 2023”

Another great book

Victor LaValle is a master at writing horiffic books that read like fairy tales. This is now my second favorite, behind the Changeling, of his.

Great Story; Not so Scary

This book started out so well, and by the end of the first section I was deeply invested in what was going on with Adelaide and the secret of her steamer trunk. The second section, though, moved in a new direction and introduced several new characters, all of which pulled me right out of the creepy mood that had been established so brilliantly in the first section. By the end of the novel I’d pretty much forgotten that I was reading horror at all. Skipping over the climactic scene in the opera house was, I think, a mistake. That moment was built up for too many chapters for it just to be fast-forwarded past. So many spooky details throughout the second two sections were just left sort of dangling. This novel had the opportunity to be a terrific fright fest, but it ended up reading like historical fiction with just some hints at horror.

Nicely done

I enjoy the telling of this book. The storyline works for me. The storyteller is okay

A new genre for me

I loved it yet didn’t expect the twists and turns and finding myself a bit skeptical.

Best performance

Original and genre bending. One of my all time favorite Aubible productions. I’ll will by looking for more stories by the author.

we all have secrets

The truth sets us free. The narrator was excellent and woman united are strong

Intense storyline

It was not too slow. Not too detailed great story am glad I read it

Would’ve never found this on my own, but loved it!

I was assigned this novel for a Lit course. I was not excited about it at first but overall this was a good read (listen). The narrator did a great job on all fronts. Highly recommend!!

Great horror story

This was a very creatively written novel. A bit slow at the beginning. The characters, although novel to horror, are a type that actually existed in the Western territories of late 19 th century America. The stories of Blk homesteaders and farmers, and especially Blk women who helped populate and build the West are hardly ever told. Also the role of the Chinese in opening the West is often ignored. Not that this a tedious and didactic story; it was so much fun to read! A very inventive and original novel!

Not my cup of tea

I was kind of surprised about this story, not into monsters and demons. It was a little different to each his own some might enjoy it. I wouldn’t recommend it.