Unleashed

“Oregon Book Award–winning Emmons examines a family’s fracturing within the framework of escalating natural disaster…. In this poignant novel, Emmons reveals how people react under high levels of stress, capturing the reader’s imagination as she moves in an unexpected direction. Excellent for book discussion groups.”
—Library Journal (starred)

“There’s much to admire here in Emmons’ crisp,evocative prose and thoughtful character studies.”
—Booklist

“What seems like your basic California wine country empty-nest story goes off in wildly unexpected directions…. It’s quite a trip.”
—Kirkus

”Unleashed is deeply insightful about our current moment, the way we struggle to balance the quotidian conflicts of love and family with the apocalyptic thunderclouds ever-growing over our heads. Cai Emmons has written a rich and moving book about the things that make life matter, even during the darkest times.”
—Dan Chaon, author of Sleepwalk

“A gripping and exquisite novel of love, loss, and estrangement in a brutally changing world. A propulsive family drama, Unleashed is also a passionate tale of transformation, with characters who leap off the page and a story that will captivate readers with its magic and warmth.”
—Bruce Holsinger, award-winning author of The Displacements

“Unleashed is a clever and audacious novel that enacts the disruption it depicts, carrying the reader from deft contemporary realism to vivid surrealism that feels, somehow, like coming home. A beautiful fable of the clarity wrought by devastation, and a hymn to life. This is a special book—wild, earnest, and bold.”
—Lacy Crawford, author of Notes on a Silencing

Cai Emmons (1951-2023) was the author of six novels-His Mother’s Son, The Stylist, Weather Woman, Sinking Islands, Unleashed, and Livid-and a story collection, Vanishing. She held a BA from Yale University and two MFAs, one from New York University in film and the other from the University of Oregon in fiction. Before turning to fiction, Emmons wrote plays and screenplays. Winner of a Student Academy Award, an Oregon Book Award, and the Leapfrog Global Fiction Prize, and finalist for the Narrative, The Missouri Review, and the Sarton awards, she taught at a variety of institutions, most recently in the creative writing program at the University of Oregon.

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