A vivid, gripping, emotional, and addictive read, Sudden Rain is also a rare and valuable portrait of an era: the long-lost final manuscript of Maritta Wolff-the author who, at the age of twenty-two, published what Sinclair Lewis deemed "the most important novel of the year," Whistle Stop (1941).
This is a compelling drama that offers great insight into the nature of marriage -- both then and now.
Now that Sudden Rain has come out of its hiding place -- in Wolff's refrigerator, found after her death -- it remains gloriously frozen in time. Set in the fall of 1972, the novel perfectly captures, with expansive emotion and cinematic detail, the domestic trends of three generations of middle-class couples living in suburban Los Angeles. A brilliant portrait of its burgeoning era, Sudden Rain also offers striking cultural commentary on our everyday notions of love and marriage; individuality, equality, and community; and the promise and pursuit of the American Dream.
"Wolff weaves the era's social upheaval into each foreboding page, but it's her devastating insight into what people say and do...that makes this book a page-turner."
