THE SURROGATE

The arrival of a charming stranger shakes the delicate balance of a family in mourning.

When 30-year-old psychologist Alex Ross gets the call that her cousin Rolf has died in a car accident, her world falls apart. Alex is an only child, but coming from a from a close-knit extended family, she and Rolf were twin flames; his death makes her feel like she’s “trapped in a dense haze.” But when Alex’s Aunt Frannie, Rolf’s mother, becomes friends with Nathaniel, a handsome and mysterious patron of the bookstore she owns, Alex begins to emerge from the fog. Nathaniel possesses many of the traits Alex admired in Rolf, and her budding friendship with him transforms into a whirlwind romance. Things are far from smooth sailing, however. Rolf’s mercurial older brother, Stephen, doesn’t trust Nathaniel’s quick integration into their family and tries to warn Alex away from him. Stephen, who always envied the attention Rolf attracted, seems to be burying his grief by diving into his job in wealth management—it’s the eve of the 2008 financial crisis—and into a new relationship with standoffish Annalise, whose own obsession with Nathaniel bubbles just beneath the surface. As Alex processes her grief, she begins to question her dependency on Nathaniel. Though Miller’s dialogue ranges from overly expository to overly therapy-esque, the story is suffused with intrigue and a gripping melancholy, and Alex’s internal journey is at once believable and profound.

An atmospheric meditation on grief and healing.