CRIMES OF ENDEARMENT

In Jones’ novel, an orphaned girl finds a home and considerable talent in 1990s Texas.

In 1994, 9-year-old Heather Morrison narrowly avoids getting on a plane that goes on to crash, killing her whole nuclear family. Heather is staying with her grandmother when the tragedy occurs, and when the elderly woman learns the news, she has a heart attack and dies. The girl flees, and the following day, ornithologist Scott Finneman discovers her wandering alone in the Texas Hill Country. After he finds out about her situation, he resists the impulse to place her in state custody, and he purchases a forged birth certificate and raises the girl (whom he calls “Phoenix,” or “Fee”) as his own. With the assistance of psychologist Susan Pederson, he helps Fee uncover the traumatic memories that have made her so emotionally volatile. Scott and Susan begin to suspect that the Morrisons may not have been her real parents, and the darkest horrors of her past take years to surface. As Fee grows, she spends time in the wilderness, takes an interest in boys, and discovers an enthusiasm for birding that makes her one of the most respected birders in Texas. Later, she employs her expert knowledge in an unexpected way during a crisis. Jones has taken a familiar narrative structure and employed it to fashion a wholly original story. His skillful deployment of Dickensian tropes will make readers deeply invested in Fee’s fate from the first pages, and as the novel unfolds, it yields profoundly satisfying moments of horror, suspense, and triumph. Despite the book’s ample length of more than 500 pages, the pacing never flags; indeed, it gains momentum as the story nears its conclusion. Fee’s journey to maturity evokes Tom Wolfe’s I Am Charlotte Simmons (2004), while the sweep and setting are reminiscent, at times, of Richard Linklater’s 2014 film Boyhood. This is powerfully cathartic storytelling—sentimental in the best sense, and magnificent in its ability to portray the full scope of a young woman’s life.

A beautifully rendered, emotionally engaging epic about growing up.