WILD GROUND

Jennifer is haunted by her past life—can she make peace with the destruction it caused, or will it consume her?

Present-day Jennifer is sober, lives in London, and works at a cafe; her life is stable, routine. But her world is upended when she’s unexpectedly visited by someone from her past. This person, Denz, brings with him a tidal wave of memories—some good, many traumatic. Suddenly, Jennifer—back then “Neef”—is 12 years old again, first meeting Danny, the boy who would go on to shape her adolescence in ways both expansive and wounding. Both Danny and Neef are outsiders in their small town just outside Leeds—Danny because he’s Black and Neef because she’s a newcomer. Despite the efforts of Denz, Danny’s father, to keep the two apart, Danny and Neef are drawn to one another: by turns romantically, platonically, frenetically. They grow together, toward and away from one another, through their teenage years. They dream of moving to London: Danny, a brilliant gardener, will be a botanist and horticulturist, and Neef, a talented writer, will make a name for herself in the big city. But they are crippled by the systemic injustices of their town—addiction, poverty, racism, housing insecurity, assault. Years later, Neef—now Jennifer—is confronted with her still-raw past. Usher’s prose, much of it written in northern English dialect, is electric—each character, place, and location surges with a gripping urgency and vitality. Her narrative world, however chilling, feels totally honest, alive, and exacting. Usher’s pacing, too, is remarkable; each turn is unexpected and yet wholly fitting, each transition between present and past seamless and ensnaring.

Both harrowing and hopeful, a generative bildungsroman from an exciting debut novelist.