Pull Me Under

Elle's 33 Best Books of the Year

A Searing Debut Novel from One of the Most Imaginative Minds in Fiction

Kelly Luce's Pull Me Under is a suspense novel with a female protagonist that gets more right about women than so many others I've read in the past few years (NPR).

Luce tells the story of Rio Silvestri, who, when she was twelve years old, fatally stabbed a school bully. Rio, born Chizuru Akitani, is the Japanese American daughter of the revered violinist Hiro Akitani--a Living National Treasure in Japan and a man Rio hasn't spoken to since she left her home country for the United States (and a new identity) after her violent crime. Her father's death, along with a mysterious package that arrives on her doorstep in Boulder, Colorado, spurs her to return to Japan for the first time in twenty years. There she is forced to confront her past in ways she never imagined, pushing herself, her relationships with her husband and daughter, and her own sense of who she is to the brink.