Clementine is a girl in trouble. She's homeless, living in a conversion van at a campground tucked into a little stretch of riverfront on the Potomac. She's hungry, craving Pop-Tarts while forced to eat fried snake for supper. And she's pregnant. Daddy says he'll fix it. But unlike Mama and the folks who believe he can walk on water, Clem knows better than to trust Daddy.
In Precious Ugly (7.13 Books; August 18, 2026), Rae Cline draws us into the story of a thirteen-year-old girl seeking to escape her abusive, alcoholic, charismatic father and desperate to protect her mother. Set in 1985 in Harpers Ferry and Jolo, West Virginia, it's a story anchored in the promise of Reagan, the fear of AIDS, the songs of Patti Smith, Cyndi Lauper, and Tina Turner heard through a Walkman, and other signs of its time and place. It's also a universal and ongoing story about poverty, addiction, religious charlatans, sexual predators, and how children are made to suffer for the sins of their parents. As told through the eyes of its remarkable young heroine, Precious Ugly is ultimately a story about the everyday marvels of tenacity and resourcefulness, the kindness of strangers, and the possibility of breaking the cycle of domestic violence and generational trauma.
