Holloway

by Elana K. Arnold

Award-winning author Elana K. Arnold returns with a boldly visionary, deeply felt story that crosses space and time to examine loss and love in a world on the brink.

It is the late summer of 2021, and a girl named Nora is on the Paris Metro.

Nora, whose mother loved her, even though Nora was broken.

Nora, who couldn’t help her mother when her mother needed her most.

Nora, from whom the pandemic has taken nearly everything, save the object she clings to: a cylinder containing her mother’s ashes.

With no family left, no friends to speak of, and no way to turn back time, Nora has come to France to keep a promise she never got to make: to spread the ashes in a place her mother never got to see. But instead, Nora finds herself on the run through a forest in the night, taking refuge in a dark holloway. And when she wakes, and tries to make her way back to something she recognizes, she realizes that is impossible.

Because it is no longer 2021.

Questioning everything—including her own sanity—Nora sets out on a journey through a time and place completely foreign to her, and yet one that, much like the time and place she came from, is defined by death, loss, fear, and uncertainty. A journey in which she must find a way to honor her mother—and heal herself—in a world that feels irrevocably broken.

Genres: Young Adult, Historical Fiction, Magical Realism, Fiction, Time Travel, Fantasy, Historical

352 pages, Hardcover

Published May 5, 2026

About the author

ELANA K. ARNOLD writes books for and about children and teens. She holds a master’s degree in Creative Writing/Fiction from the University of California, Davis where she has taught Creative Writing and Adolescent Literature. Her most recent YA novel, DAMSEL, is a Printz Honor book, Her 2017 novel, WHAT GIRLS ARE MADE OF, was a finalist for the National Book Award, and her middle grade novel, A BOY CALLED BAT, is a Junior Library Guild Selection. A parent and educator living in Huntington Beach, California, Elana is a frequent speaker at schools, libraries, and writers’ conferences. Currently, Elana is the caretaker of seven pets, only three of which have fur. Sign up for her newsletter here: https://elanakarnold.us10.list-manage...

Reviews

[quillnqueer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sometimes you just gotta deal with your mental health by travelling back in time to 1940s France to join a commune.

The time travel aspect was cleverly done, although I don't know if it was actually needed. Still, it was utilised well, opening up paths for Nora as she tries to come to terms with the death of her mother, who she had a complicated relationship with.

This is heavy on the COVID pandemic / anti vax theories, with an autistic protagonist that's coming to terms with the way her anti vax mother thought and felt about her. The autistic rep in this is so perfectly done, and you can easily see this is own voices.

I loved that this was cosy, and heartwarming. While dealing with the tougher subjects, this story made me feel like I was in a safe space, by setting the story in an Asylum - but not a medical one, one that actually allowed it's patients to heal, create art, and talk. I loved finding out at the end that it was a real place.

[Shannon Miz · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5*

Holloway sort of snuck up on me as I was reading it. See, it starts out fairly quiet, a bit melancholic, with Nora taking her mother's ashes to France as a last goodbye. But as it progressed, it sucked me into Nora's story so completely. For the first few chapters, I felt somewhat ambivalent about the story, but (and I don't even know at what exact point it happened) I eventually found myself completely enraptured by it. Nora has such a complicated relationship with her mother, and it really pulls at the heartstrings, especially as we find out more. It is heartbreaking that Nora's mom encouraged her to not be her authentic self, but seeing Nora realize that her mom was wrong is a big win, too. There's a lot of commentary in here about the way society treats neurodivergent folks, and that in itself is worth the read, but there is so much more to it. Complexity of the relationships of mothers and daughters, found families, friendships, romance, coping with loss, this lovely book has a little of everything.

Bottom Line: While it started off a little slower, patience is a virtue here, as this book was well worth the ride.

You can find the full review and all the fancy and/or randomness that accompanies it at It Starts at Midnight

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful and devastating. Arnold does a great job examining the sorrow and frustrations of a teen whose parent falls down the conspiracy/anti-vax rabbit hole.

[callistoscalling · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you to the publisher for a gifted copy; all thoughts are my own.

📖 Book Review 📖 Trauma changes us. It almost feels like our cells break down to a new molecular configuration and our brain rewires so that everything is recategorized into compartments of before and after. Elana K. Arnold’s surrealistic novel conquers our latest collective trauma of a pandemic with the lasting impacts of this strange and scary time that brought global isolation. Holloway blends art and the literary world in a hauntingly beautiful story that spans time, bringing a reflective tale of grief and healing across generations.

[Clay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this one and it would make a fine audio, though "time travel" in the description makes it sound other than it is. in pandemic 2021, 18YO autistic Nora-raised until she's eight by her loving gran, then by her distant, disapproving, anti-vax mother-journeys back in time via an ancient track, the titular holloway. There she discovers who she is, makes relative peace with her mother, and ultimately finds a loving community to belong to in 1946 France. Thoughtful, beautifully structured and written. Recommended to teens who appreciate a deep, complex story and to adults as well.

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you to Harper 360 YA UK and Clarion Books for the ARC, it hasn’t affected my honest review. 

TW: death, grief, COVID, ableism, war, attempted sexual assault, abandonment, trauma, anti vaccines rhetoric, institutionalization 

Release date: 18th June 2026 (UK) 

In summer 2021, grieving 18 year old daughter Nora travels to Paris in order to scatter her mother’s ashes at the park most famous for appearing in Seurat’s legendary ‘A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jette’. Nora is autistic and her relationship with her mother Gillian was always difficult, growing even worse during the COVID-19 pandemic after they clashed over vaccines, but they always shared a love for beautiful art. Having given up everything she owns to fund the trip, all Nora has left is the bamboo cylinder of her mother’s ashes. Upon arriving in Paris, it isn’t the haven she expected it to be- and upon fleeing into the night after wandering the French countryside, Nora stumbles into a holloway (a sunken path lower than a road)- and back through time to 1946. There she starts to doubt her sanity, especially when she meets figures from history and travels across post war France where loss and death so resembles the world she left behind. However, Nora soon finds that in order to heal herself- and reconcile her relationship with the memory of her mother- she must discover a new kind of hope through connection and art. 

What can I possibly say about this book other than it's deeply emotional and moving, combining history, family drama and time travel so smoothly that you can't stop reading. The description doesn't do ‘Holloway’ justice for just how much it covers.  It's a slow burn, the journey of a grieving daughter travelling to scatter the ashes of her complicated mother, but also a story of resilience, bravery and enduring hope. Nora is a beautifully written character, her narration covers all aspects of her life from childhood and we really get to know how her mind works in a world that isn't friendly to neurodivergent people. I adored her connection to art, how she feels seen by it and the way it makes her feel- I related so heavily to that. I loved how Seurat brought Nora and Gillian together when they clashed in so many other ways and how Nora accidentally wandered into a historic cave painting discovery in Lascaux (which I studied last year for university). The way Gillian is written was fascinating, especially as she fell further into anti vaccine conspiracy around Nora's autism. In the novel Nora establishes a connection with Adrien, a teen wandering the woods with his dog Robot, Auguste, an autistic carver, and two queer women, Beryl and Penella; these relationships had my entire heart, especially because of the joy and hope she finds in them. One aspect of ‘Holloway’ I thought was so unique is the way that post war history is compared to what was happening in 2021 and how similar people are throughout time. Her connection to a painting from a childhood broke me by the end, especially when it becomes clear why it's so special. If you love time travel, powerful historical fiction, art and a focus on family, ‘Holloway’ is for you. 

[Grace]

I don’t think it’s fair to call this a dnf but putting this down for future ref I got to like page 8 and a scene was set in Covid and I didn’t want that harshing my summer reading vibe

[Raska · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was so interesting. Mother daughter issues, autism and a little time travel thrown in. I didn’t think I would like it as much as I did.

[Jill · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow! What a creative story. The characters experience loss and pain, but they also experience beauty and a way to move forward. Another new author found through the National Book Festival authors.

[Forever Young Adult]

Graded By: Mandy C.
Cover Story: Collage
BFF Charm: Let Me Love You
Swoonworthy Scale: 7
Talky Talk: In Her Head
Bonus Factors: Neurodivergence, Signs of the Times
Anti-Bonus Factor: Dan Scott Award for Awful Parenting
Relationship Status: You’re in My Heart

Read the full book report here.

[Abigail Handy-Garcia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This beautiful, beautiful story… met me full of surprise, shone a light through a million cracks, and left me pondering many things. There’s not really much else I can say other than… I hope you read it too. And it meets you in similar spaces, in similar ways.

[Sarah Newman · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars - beautifully written

[Sacha · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

This is a really inventive effort from Arnold that worked well for me in some ways. One thing is for sure: Arnold does A LOT in this novel.

Readers meet Nora in Paris on the Metro, where she's riding along with her mother's ashes. Already a wild start. We soon discover that Nora is autistic and that her mother's death could have been prevented if only her mother hadn't gotten herself into the horrible filth that is fake news. Her mom has some, uh, non-scientific views about vaccines and really loves a bizarro conspiracy theory, and these things - in addition to fully alienating her daughter - end up killing her during the pandemic. At this point, I have exactly no tolerance for people's obsession with believing lies and nonsense, especially when it comes to how much that harms society as a whole, so I struggled getting through some of this content. Ya, it's fiction, but it's also our reality, and that is gross. Arnold has a great author's note in which she describes her impetus for this book and her ongoing concerns about how folks operate in the world at this time, and readers won't be surprised by her insights after they complete this book.

Oh, and Nora is already on a tough journey, but it's made more bizarre by the time travel/magical realism element that honestly I could have done without. I get the point, but I felt at times like I was working in two different novels and think I'd have preferred that. Yes, folks were in extreme danger before based on their identities, and they sure are again, but I'm just not totally sure about this particular genre mash up.

This is an intriguing effort, and while it's not my favorite from this author, I enjoyed it overall and definitely recommend it to folks looking for something new.

*Special thanks to NetGalley and Clarion Books for this arc and alc, which I received in exchange for an honest review. The opinions expressed here are my own.

[✩｡°⋆ Lala ⋆｡°✩ · Rating 4 out of 5]

✦•┈๑⋅⋯ Holloway by Elana K. Arnold ⋯⋅๑┈•✦

➝ • 4/5 ☆ •

✧ Holloway is one of those books that pretends it’s going to be normal for the first few chapters before immediately going off the rails. Arnold drops you into a world that looks familiar, then starts pulling at the seams. The writing is lush in a poetic way, and it works. Dreamy, eerie, and still grounded enough that you can actually stay with it without getting lost.

The characters are messy in a way that feels intentional, not chaotic for the sake of it. Everyone is carrying something sharp or secret or just deeply inconvenient, and the book lets them unravel without rushing them. The atmosphere does a lot of the work here, foggy, strange, slightly off in a way you can’t quite explain. It builds this slow pressure that makes everything feel like it’s leaning in a little too close. Honestly, kind of unsettling.

It’s not perfect. A few moments drift into “okay, what is happening here” territory, but the overall effect still holds. Strange, unsettling, and beautifully written in a way that makes you wonder if the book is messing with you on purpose. A good pick if you like your stories weird, a little feral, and not interested in explaining themselves too much. ✧

If you like:

✔️ surreal fiction
✔️ eerie atmosphere
✔️ messy characters
✔️ slow burn weirdness
✔️ lyrical prose
✔️ uncanny vibes

📅 Pub Day: Out Today 📚
💌 ARC gifted via NetGalley from HarperAudio Children's. All opinions are my own.
🗣 QOTD: Do you prefer stories that explain everything or stories that leave you with questions?

[Cosmic Reads Club · Rating 2 out of 5]

Holloway is one of those books that I can appreciate more than I actually enjoyed.

What stood out most to me was the atmosphere. The beginning felt incredibly heavy, almost oppressive at times, and created a strong emotional weight that immediately caught my attention. The story also takes several unexpected turns, especially regarding the protagonist’s mothers, beliefs, and identity, which kept it from feeling predictable.

The book touches on a number of interesting topics, particularly autism, art, self-discovery, and the way we perceive both ourselves and the world around us. By the end, the author reveals that she herself was diagnosed with autism, which made me appreciate the story more and gave additional context to the protagonist’s perspective. I found that aspect genuinely valuable and interesting.

Unfortunately, despite the themes, the story never truly worked for me. While I could see what the book was trying to do, I never felt emotionally invested in the narrative itself. The plot often felt slow, and I struggled to stay engaged throughout. There were moments I found thought-provoking, but overall I felt disconnected from the story and its execution.

I can absolutely imagine this book resonating deeply with other readers, especially those interested in character-driven literary fiction and neurodivergent perspectives. For me, however, it simply wasn’t the right fit.

A thoughtful and well-intentioned novel with important themes, but one that never quite found the same wavelength as me.

[Lara · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great time-travel/stable time loop series (the way I sat bolt upright when that happened), a good perspective of life for a teenager during the height of Covid in 2020/21, and--so far as I can tell from my more or less neurotypical perspective, a really excellent autistic narrator. We are deep in Nora's head throughout, and I can feel her awkwardness, the way being enclosed makes her feel safe and comfortable, her struggles with speech and conversation, her fascination with art and perspective.

This is why this review is spoiler-tagged...it is also a painful, eventual hopeful portrait of the relationship between Nora the autistic daughter and her anti-vax mom Gillian. It's done very, very well. We know from the start that Gillian is dead and Nora is grieving her deeply. We see that Gillian loved Nora and was a devoted parent. Then we see that Gillian believed that the MMR vaccination caused Nora to be autistic, and that she spent much of Nora's childhood trying to coax her towards "normality". And finally, that she was so vehemently anti-vax that she refused to either get the Covid vaccination or let Nora get it, and she died insisting that she didn't want the vaccine to ruin her like it ruined Nora. We move through it with Nora, and it lets us develop feelings about Gillian too. This could have been a story where Gillian is the villain, and while she's villainous in spots, she's never the antagonist. Love is such a complex thing, and you can love and miss someone while still knowing that they hurt you.

I hugged the book twice. I hope Nora is happy.

[DeAnne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Holloway is definitely a slower read, but it is so worth it - so if a slower pace puts you off, but you really enjoy family dynamics between mothers and daughters (not always good ones) and exploring of found families and friendships, then you still may want to give this one a try. It's definitely a story you should take your time with and absorb fully.

The relationship between Nora and her dead mother, and the revelations of what they were before her mother's death, were quite an exploration in the dynamic where a parent thinks they know what is best for their child, but in fact they do not. The child coming to that realization is even more of a revelation in the story.

Nora's story is a wonderful journey, not just in her realizations and healing but also in the time travel aspect. After dealing with the pandemic and losing her mother, she is heading to France to decide where to scatter her mother's ashes, and that leads to her waking up in 1946. The lens through the world after the worst events of the pandemic juxtaposed with the view of post World War II Europe.

This is a heartfelt story with far more depth than you would originally think. The writing is beautiful and poignant and worth taking your time with.

[TheNextGenLibrarian · Rating 4 out of 5]

To heal from the past, she must survive in another time.
🇫🇷
In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, Nora travels to France carrying her mother’s ashes and the weight of her grief. But after a frightening night in the woods, she awakens to find herself no longer in 2021. Stranded in an unfamiliar time marked by its own struggles and loss, Nora must navigate a world that feels both distant and strangely familiar while searching for a way to honor her mother, make peace with her past, and find hope again.
😷
This book completely surprised me. It starts quietly and mournfully, and I wasn’t immediately hooked, but before I knew it I was fully invested in Nora’s story. The exploration of her complicated relationship with her mother was especially powerful, as was Nora’s journey toward embracing her authentic self. With themes of neurodivergence, grief, found family, friendship, and love, this is a thoughtful, emotional read that lingered with me long after I finished. The prose was stunning throughout.

CW: pandemic, parental death, death, illness, medical content, assault, theft, grief, ableism, mental health issues, confinement

[The Page Ladies Book Club · Rating 5 out of 5]

📚🔍 Time travel, cult mysteries, cozy sleuths, and classic whodunits? This reading stack kept me guessing from beginning to end!

Holloway by Elana K. Arnold delivered an emotional and thought-provoking story about grief, healing, and finding your way through impossible circumstances. Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie reminded me why Miss Marple remains one of my favorite detectives, with a clever mystery and a village full of suspects. It's About Time by Carol J. Perry was a fun, cozy mystery packed with quirky characters, amateur sleuthing, and just the right amount of charm. Meanwhile, Vervain Hollow by Catriona Silvey brought an eerie atmosphere, cult intrigue, and unsettling twists that kept me turning pages.

Together, these books offered a little bit of everything, historical mystery, contemporary suspense, emotional journeys, and cozy crime-solving. Whether you love classic detectives, haunting mysteries, or character-driven stories, this collection has something worth adding to your TBR.

✨️ Thank you, Clarion Books, William Morrow, Harper Collins, Black Dog & Leventhal Pub, Kensington Cozies, Union Square, and the authors for sharing these books with us!

[Chrissy · Rating 5 out of 5]

The is quite possibly the first pandemic novel that I have truly enjoyed, and I didn't expect to do so. The many disparate pieces of the story, Nora's history with her mother and grandmother, the scary not-quite-post pandemic days, her love of art, her current traveling; it didn't seem like they would form such a gracious whole, but they definitely did. Nora's voice is very clear, and her descriptions of her feelings bring the reader right into her mind, and the frustrations and pains she feels. The contrast of pandemic recovery with recovery from other world wide traumas is poingiant and feels relevant for anyone who live through it and was robbed of time, people and freedom. While there are some points of drama in the action, the author sticks with internal feelings as the main driver of the plot. The author wove together ideas about fear, love, mental health, recovery, prejudice and parenting into a whole that was beautiful to me. I hope this book finds others who will appreciate it as well.

[Lisa Camara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Neurodivergent time traveler

Wow. This book kind of blew me away.

Post pandemic and Nora is all alone. No family, no home- Just a bamboo cylinder containing her mother's ashes and a heavy guilt upon her shoulders. She is determined to spend the last of her money to scatter her mom's ashes in France- a huge feat for neurodivergent Nora. Out of money and indecisive about where to spread the ashes, she falls asleep in the forest and awakens in 1946.

I can't give this enough praise. The writing is so beautiful and luring. I received this as an audiobook from netgalley, but it errored and I literally ran out and bought it as soon as it released. I felt myself drawn to Nora and so invested in her story.

Narrator - Kira Fixx 5/5 stars.

5/5- Best book i've read so far this year.

Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy of this audiobook

[Roxana]

I really enjoyed this book. The writing was wonderful and felt calming to me. Nora, isan 18 year old girl who is neurodivergent and who lost her mother during the pandemic. She decides she wants to take her mother's ashes to France, but once she gets there, is just utterly lost. She is questioning her decision and just doesn't know what to do. One night when she is camping in the woods, she is approached by a man, and fearing her safety, runs and ends up in a Hollow in the woods. When she emerges, she finds herself, unbelievably, in 1945, right after the war ended. With nothing except the clothes on her back and her mother's ashes, she finds a kind boy who helps her. Without giving too much away, she finds herself living with a variety of real-life famous people who help her along and accept her for who she is. The book is filled with history, and I found myself googling all the art and individuals mentioned in the book to see what Nora was seeing. I really liked this book.

[Chris G. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Covid’s isolation was a bit of a boon to autistic Nora; she revels in great swaths of time to lose herself in her art. Her relationship with her mother is complicated by her mother’s early abandonment of her, leaving her in the care of her now-dead grandmother. When her mother dies of Covid, Nora sets off to France to scatter her mother’s ashes; that journey and the decision about where the ashes should go takes Nora through a holloway, time traveling to post-World War II France, and provides an intersection with the missing years when her mother left her. Arnold intriguingly meshes themes about mothers and daughters, guilt and forgiveness, LGBTQ history, and grounds them with some real historical figures who Nora meets in a rural asylum for the insane. A captivating read. Earc from Edelweiss.

[USOM · Rating 4 out of 5]

(Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher. This has not impacted my review which is unbiased and honest.)

Holloway begins as a story about accidental time travel and becomes a story about neurodiversity. This historical fiction is multi-faceted. Nora is grieving her mother and as a send off decides to sprinkle her ashes in France. But there she begins to un-pack her relationship with her mother. The good, the bad, and the emotional. All the ways her thoughts on vaccines during the pandemic, about her beliefs about Nora's vaccinations and her autism, and unpacks her mother's impact on her own life. How there was love, but there was also a deep misunderstanding, a loss of a relationship they could have had. In Holloway Nora embarks on this journey to say goodbye and instead ends up being about discovery.

[Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extraordinary and evocative. I enjoyed Arnold’s other books, but this one— wow. The ways Nora navigates her relationship with her mother and her place in a world that doesn’t have patience for people with autism… the feelings of utter aloneness after Gillian refuses the Covid vaccine and dies… Nora’s determination to honor her mother by taking her ashes to France… and the upheaval of everything she thinks she knows after stumbling onto a path in the forest that somehow transports her back to 1946. Art plays an essential role throughout the story, and Arnold’s weaving of words and events and characters into a completely satisfying resolution is its own work of art. Seriously— read this.

Thank you, HarperCollins and NetGalley for the advance e-book copy.

[Bugs · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just this...

"If you’re lucky enough to find people who love you, people you can love in return . . . does it really matter where they are? Or when?

Maybe time, like love, isn’t a straight line.
Maybe it’s a curve and an arc and a spiral, too.
Maybe it’s a cord wrapped around the neck of a half-birthed child.
Maybe time is a cave, so deep there seems no end.
Maybe it’s a constellation, each moment a sharp bright point, revealing its meaning only if one can step back, back, back again—or in, closer and closer, and closer, still.
Maybe time is a breath, held and released."

~ Nora's final words.. [poetically crafted by Elana K. Arnold, performed to heartrending resonance by Kira Fixx]

[Amanda Shepard (Between-the-Shelves) · Rating 3 out of 5]

You can't convince me that teenagers want to read about COVID yet, so I'm not sure how popular this book is going to be with actual teenagers. It is a fairly slow moving book, filled with more introspection and flashbacks than actual plot action. It definitely reads more like literary fiction, which isn't always a bad thing. But I think you definitely need to be in the right state of mind to read this story.

I appreciated the magical realism nature of the story, and how the historical moment that Nora goes back to relates to the COVID pandemic. It was a good book for reflecting on family relationships, as Nora's relationship with her mom was complicated. If you want something that's quieter, this might be the book for you.

[Allison · Rating 2 out of 5]

After a very slow start in the end of the Covid pandemic, the rest of the story is obscured by too much going on at once in this book. Nora is a neurodivergent, newly-adult orphan who sells everything and abandons her life in the US to go to France so she can scatter her mother’s ashes in 2021. The book contains her drifting and living in a tent, an attack and escape, time travel reminiscent of Kindred (holocaust instead of slavery), LGBTQ issues, antisemitism, parental abandonment, a character dying from a meteorite, love scenes, and childbirth. All of this is too much for one book and distracts from a main plot.

[Stephanie Fairholm · Rating 2 out of 5]

Very slow beginning, and it takes a while to realize what’s truly going on. The time traveling didn’t make sense, but I appreciated the friendships she made because of it.

Overall, there was too much put into one story. It felt all over the place, and when it finally seemed alright, something else happened and it was just frustrating.

I was quite happy with the ending, until the last page. Did she really choose to leave her new-found friendships behind? What’s the point of that then?

Long story short: Some parts were really good, but there were too many that counteracted those good parts that made the book a very frustrating read.

[Angie Gascho · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a beautifully crafted YA novel that uses time travel to explore complicated relationships and complicated histories. The story centers on 18-year-old Nora, whose mother died during the COVID-19 pandemic, as she travels to France to scatter her mother's ashes at a place she would have loved. Completely alone in the world, Nora embarks on a journey of self-discovery and acceptance as she tries to find a way to come to peace with the reality of her relationship with her mother and the broken world around her. The story is contemporary, historical, and layered with honest, heartfelt emotions.