Unfurled

by Michelle Bailat-Jones

What are the boundaries between imagination and delusion? When Ella's father John dies unexpectedly, she learns that the past she believed in never really happened. For more than twenty years, Ella has learned to live without her mother, learned to forget the woman with paranoid delusions who abandoned their small family the summer Ella turned ten, learned to accept the likely scenario that her homeless mother died on the streets. But John's accident changes everything. The unsettling questions raised by John's death and Maggie's unwanted reappearance send Ella on a journey to discover the truth - the truth about the woman who abandoned her and the man who raised her and why they kept their story a secret. This is a novel about loss and forgiveness, about imagination and that gift's more menacing form, delusion.

Genres: Fiction

272 pages, Paperback

First published October 16, 2018

About the author

Michelle Bailat-Jones is a writer and translator. Her début novel Fog Island Mountains (Tantor 2014) won the 2013 Christopher Doheny Award from the Center for Fiction and Audible. She has also translated Charles Ferdinand Ramuz’s 1927 Swiss classic Beauty on Earth (Onesuch Press, 2013). She is the Reviews Editor at the web journal Necessary Fiction, and her fiction, poetry, translations, and criticism have appeared in a number of journals, including The Kenyon Review, The Rumpus, Hayden’s Ferry Review, the Quarterly Conversation, PANK, Spolia Mag, Two Serious Ladies, and The Atticus Review. She lives in Switzerland.

Reviews

[Christina Loeffler · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received a copy of this book from Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review. All opinions presented are my own.

I'd probably rank this one between 3.5 and 3.75 stars but I'm going to round up to an even 4. I don't know why I have such difficulty just rating on a 1-5 scale but here we are, yet again.

Unfurled by Michelle Bailat-Jones is a deeply moving story about loss, grief, mental illness and self discovery. There was so much here working for Bailat-Jones but I still had a few hang-ups that made it a bit difficult for me to be fully engrossed in this story.

I'll start this off with what didn't work for me:

Firstly, the sea, boats and other nautical themes are heavily relied upon here. It's such an ingrained part of the story and the relationship between Ella and her late father that I feel I may not have been the intended audience for this. There are terms and themes that even a layman would understand but this story definitely goes beyond that. There were multiple points in which I was unsure if I was reading a typo or not and had to rely on the good ol' jazz hands, google routine to learn that it wasn't an error but ship terminology I had no prior knowledge of. (However, I did learn a lot of new things about ships and that's never a bad thing!)

Secondly, the kindle version of this is a crime. This is not to the fault of Bailat-Jones but it made it extremely difficult to get into a state of deep reading. I ended up just using Adobe Digital Editions because the kindle version was totally screwy. Page numbers were in the middle of paragraphs, sentences and paragraphs were split seemingly out of nowhere and it made it extremely difficult to read seamlessly.

My last issue with the overall story was that there were no formatting changes when Ella was having flashbacks. She would be in present day, dealing with her grief then switch into a memory with her mother but there was no change in the formatting or acknowledgment that we were now in the past. It would happen mid-paragraph, mid-chapter and seemingly mid-sentence. It was jarring and with some of the other confusing aspects of the story it made me have to go back and reread things quite a few times to understand what was happening.

Now, for what did work:

Bailat-Jones is decidedly one of the most beautiful writers I've ever had the pleasure of reading. Her prose are whimsical and solid and she can truly create remarkable imagery for a reader. I was consistently impressed with her attention to detail and the way she was able to add beauty and elegance even to the most seemingly mundane details.

Furthermore in terms of writing, her view and take on grief and loss was stunningly real and one of the best I've read in a long time. It doesn't just sit with you in an acute sense, when the accident takes place and when the immediate loss is felt. It stays with the reader for the entire journey - the way real loss and real grief does and I found it both refreshing and beautifully heartbreaking.

At it's core this is a very real and raw look at family, self-discovery, grief, loss and struggle. It's a story about finding yourself, about finding courage and strength in even the most difficult times and about how family may be complicated but they're worth the work and effort because in the end, family is all you have.

All in all this was a beautiful book with excellent character development and exceptional writing. I'm hoping once this book is fully released to the public the kinks in the kindle version will be smoothed out because that was a huge hurdle for me to get past. I think anyone with an interest in family epics, and stories of loss and grief (but finding yourself within that) would enjoy this.

[Nancy Freund · Rating 5 out of 5]

Michelle Bailat-Jones doesn't write "easy." 'Unfurled,' like her debut novel, 'Fog Island Mountain,' is a beautiful exploration of complicated people and their relationships with one another and with themselves as they navigate their ways through the challenges and nuances of their lives... living and dead, and some liminal space in between those two states. There isn't a caracature among them. There isn't a facile conversation among the important lines of dialogue. Every metaphor is fresh. Every fulfilling delivery of lyricism is worth a slow, attentive read. I have huge admiration for this novelist and this novel. It's a gorgeous unraveling of a father-daughter relationship that seems to be one thing, and then is revealed to be something else. Same with the mother-daughter relationship also at the heart of it. It also delves into the layered foundations at the base of every marriage. The backdrop of the ocean, the ferryboat shipping community, and the Pacific Northwest in general adds a certain moody, cloudy magic that reflects the narrative with an intensity and special light that makes Ella and her family shine all the brighter.
It's not a long book. It's accessible and a relatively easy read -- but it will stay with you like only the highest art does. Defiitely recommend this one.

[Mia Franco · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been a fan of Bailat-Jones since "Fog Island Mountains." Nobody can write about loss like she can. Her characters are complicated people with complicated emotions, and by living vicariously through their experiences I'm able to learn more about myself. Ella, especially, forced me to ask hard questions of what it means to be a daughter and a parent and a wife, helping me to become more empathetic and honest in my most important relationships. "Unfurled" isn't just a compelling read with beautiful writing (although it is extremely beautiful writing--I would recommend reading it for the prose alone) it's a book that helps the reader understand what it means to be human, full of weakness and fear and dishonesty and self-preservation, yes, but also courage, and love and strength and generosity. Bailat-Jones has the incredible gift of finding beauty in moments of loss and sadness, of saying yes to life despite the heartbreak that comes with it.

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'll admit my bias up front because the author is a friend, and I had the good fortune to read Unfurled in several forms as it developed. But right from the start in a grad school workshop where I read its earliest version, this was a special novel. It is a wise and compassionate exploration of grief, and of how grief is complicated when we lose loved ones not only to death to but to mental illness. It is a story about how people struggle to make a whole life when a part of who they are is tangibly, painfully absent. And along with its rich characters and their lives, Unfurled is a story set on the edge between land and water, which is crucial to the story but is also a landscape (and seascape) so well rendered and so powerfully felt in its own right that it lends the novel an atmosphere I'd be happy to read for even without any humans involved.

[Greg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Michelle Bailat-Jones’ UNFURLED is an intricate and nuanced portrait of a young woman who has survived a troubled childhood at the hands of her mentally ill mother. Essentially the novel views questions through the lens of motherhood. Where does responsibility lie? When things go wrong, can extreme measures be well justified? Is forgiveness possible? What role does flawed memory play? What are the impacts on adult behavior? Bailat-Jones highlights these and other challenges of motherhood by bookending her novel with scenes of two troubled births. One where a dog reacts to the birth of her pups by eating them, and the other by a pregnant goat that goes into premature labor following trauma. Ella, as a veterinarian, attends at both of these births. These scenes serve as touchstones for her relationship with her own mother, Maggie. Maggie disappeared when Ella was 10 following an early childhood characterized by abuse and unpredictability. Since then, Ella has had no contact and believes Maggie may be dead.

As she copes with the untimely death of her nurturing father, John, Ella is forced to face two challenges: Maggie is alive and John has secretly maintained communication. Moreover Ella is now pregnant. She struggles to understand her father’s motivations for breaking her trust while she decides to abort her pregnancy out of fear of passing on genes for mental illness.

Bailat-Jones deftly manages this fascinating story by maintaining focus on Ella’s internal monologue. Both Maggie and John are indeed important but shadowy figures in the novel. They inhabit the story primarily though Ella’s memories. These include the realization that her father may have protected her from her mother while continuing a relationship on the sly. Likewise, Ella marginalizes her husband, Neil, by making a unilateral decision to abort her pregnancy. Neil serves the narrative mainly by arguing vehemently against the abortion. Bailat-Jones maintains tension throughout, finishing with a well-crafted ending that leaves Ella with a better understanding of her past and present.

She sets her novel in the Pacific Northwest taking advantage of the imagery of water, woods, and weather to evoke a strong sense of place. John is a ferryboat captain, fisherman, and skilled sailor. He has instilled his love of the sea in Ella. Maggie finds refuge in an isolated commune in the Oregon woods. And the rain holds a place of prominence in many scenes, most notably in a remarkable one involving the internment of John’s ashes in Puget Sound.

UNFURLED is a noteworthy achievement. It deserves a wide readership.

[Terry Pitts · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ella is about to have one very bad week. She is a veterinarian, highly sensitized to the health and needs of animals, but prone to ignoring those things that make her own well-being precarious. Almost simultaneously, Ella’s father is killed in an accident and she discovers she is pregnant. What Bailat-Jones does here is to flip the obvious scenario, which would be to close down Ella’s past and open up her future. Instead, the death of Ella’s father reveals that there were secrets he had hidden from her throughout most of her life. And bearing a child is not a future that she envisions for herself.

What I found fascinating about Unfurled was the way in which revelation and concealment act like two tectonic plates that are approaching each other and vying to dominate. As Ella hunkers down within her fear and mourning, she seems to notice every little thing within her frame of vision: “Neil’s hands on the steering wheel, my boots on the floor, my knees shaking, my hands fluttering around and over the pocket of my jacket with the torn photos.” Ella notices exactly how long certain actions take, how far she has to walk, but she won’t acknowledge (or share with the reader) the core mystery of the relationship between her father and her mother, who walked out of the marriage many years before. By the end of the book we have learned a bit more, but not everything is revealed. Instead of focusing on whatever is revealed to Ella and other, Bailat-Jones pays attention to how her characters react to those revelations.

Bailat-Jones writes with such emotional intensity that, for a few hours, reading Unfurled suddenly seemed like the most urgent thing I needed to do.

[Sara Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

The pleasure at first pass with any of Bailat-Jones' work is the writing itself. Her command of language moving between the poetic ("Neither of us realized we’d been living in a borderland all that
time, a place where the rules are too often unspoken, never declared.") to the vernacular ("Fucking beautiful dog. A stunning mouse gray with sea-green eyes. Elegantly built.") is a wonder on its own. The language transports, but the story also delivers powerful emotional and intellectual questions about the human struggle, especially when it comes to families, to secrets, and to the things we bury deep inside.

In Unfurled, the everyday struggles of characters dealing with their professions (veterinarian, ship captain, etc.) are coupled with deep seeded trauma and pain of the past pushed up against the risk of the future. This is a book that almost all of us can related to and that reminds us that we often do not know the people we love the way we think we do.

Just as powerful as her first novel, Fog Island Mountains, this second book adds another layer of familiarity and heart that makes it impossible to put down. I loved this book, and it will be on my holiday shopping list for all my favorite readers this year, especially those in my family. Because as Bailat-Jones reminds us, family is complicated. You take it where you can get it, and love it for what it is.

[Victoria · Rating 5 out of 5]

I came across this book from a friend. It was laying on her nightstand and I was immediately attracted to the beautiful cover. After reading the book, I was even more impressed with clever title. I looked up the definition of “unfurled” to find out it describes the unraveling of something from a rolled or folded state often associated with the release of a sail on a boat. I thought this was a beautiful depiction of Ella, the main character, and her journey of unraveling herself from her painful and confusing childhood growing up with a mother who had a severe mental illness.

Bailat-Jones did a beautiful job of depicting the innocence and confusion of the childhood experience growing up with a parent who has a debilitating mental illness, and the anger and avoidance that follows the child into adulthood. I connected with the book with my own experience growing up with a parent who was debilitated by alcoholism and depression. Books like this, fiction or not, remind me that I am not alone in the on-going experience relating to a parent who is odd or unable to help themselves. I would recommend to anyone interested in the mental health experience.

[Becky Yamarik · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was a rare thing; both literary, a page turner, and a completely realistic depiction of mental illness and the toll it takes on the family. I finished it in just a few days b/c I couldn't put it down. Ella's rage against the mentally ill mother who abandoned her, and the description of the mother as someone who was psychotic but told through the eyes of a 10 yr old must have been very difficult to write but seemed so realistic. As a physician at a Veterans Hospital where patients with delusions, paranoia, and psychosis are common; this book seemed so real. The story was incredibly compelling and absorbing, you really just wanted to read on and on. I even became tearful toward the end, which hardly ever happens to me when I read. I also enjoyed the back and forth in time as Ella remember's her childhood, and the fully realized characters of the father, husband, and friend George and his wife. A terrific read, can't recommend this book highly enough!

[Camala Projansky · Rating 5 out of 5]

What if the life you believed in never really happened? When Ella’s father is hit by a car and killed, the carefully constructed narrative Ella has lived with for more than twenty years suddenly unravels. Set in the fogs and waterways of the Pacific Northwest, Bailat-Jones skillfully navigates between the forward momentum of the present and glimpses of the summer Ella was ten, when her increasingly-erratic mother left.

I was pulled in immediately by the voice and beautifully crafted language, the nautical metaphors, and the very real ways that Ella fights the pain of her loss. The writing is taut, each detail precise and working on many levels.

UNFURLED is an exquisite, deeply moving novel about loss and forgiveness, and the blurry boundary between imagination and delusion. I cannot recommend it enough.

[Matt Wake · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed Unfurled, both for its exploration on mental illness and its effect on a family, and for the writers use of language.

It's a fraught tale of a life unravelling as Ella tries to make sense of her father's death and her mother's reappearance. Bailat-Jones takes us through her mother Maggie's descent into mental illness, and how her late father John dealt with this and her subsequent disappearance with a sure touch and an eye for details.

Sad without being maudlin, the book also explores what it is to be responsible, caring and determined in an increasingly illogical world.

I loved the author's earlier work, Fog Island Mountain, and here she adds more naunces and layers to offer us a family tale we can all relate to.

[Edna Axelrod · Rating 5 out of 5]

Secrets flow throughout this excellent novel, but you’ll learn none of them from me. I wouldn’t think of spoiling the pleasure of discovering them firsthand as they are deftly revealed by the author. Set near the coastal waterways of Northwest Washington State and making skillful metaphoric use of maritime imagery, the story focuses on the complex relationships in a family largely defined by a singular calamity. The central character is a young woman who is also seen as a child, and her voice at both ages rings with authenticity. The action is perfectly paced, and seamlessly moves between past and present. My only complaint is that the book isn’t longer. I really didn’t want it to end.

[Gphatty · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was happily surprised by this book, but I think this has a lot to do with my own personal experiences. It is a compulsive read, anchored with an interesting mystery, but the strongest parts -- to me -- were about the depiction of grief, and the way it disrupted and fragmented the world of our protagonist. I found the descriptions all too convincing, and they echoed my own experiences of the passing of my father many years ago, and the way everything was . . . well, Unfurled. A good read for a mature, adult, and well written family drama. A great read for anyone who has lost a parent or another close family member.

[pam · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is certainly one of the most compelling books I have read in a long time. From the very first page, I was engaged with the plight of Ella and her intensely emotional relationship with her mother. No details, no images are superfluous in this tale; Ella's understanding of the difficulties of navigating in turbulent seas and her deep concern for animals, as a veterinarian, are woven into the story of her long struggle with grief and anger. In the end I felt as though all the strands come together, multiple rich layers of life, of distrust and resentment. The beauty of the text continues to reverberate in me, leaving a powerful impact.

[Barb · Rating 4 out of 5]

When Ella's father is killed in a car accident, she returns to her PNW home to uncover letters unearthing questions about her mother who has been missing since childhood. Ella is both drawn and repelled to learn about her mother. Her husband and father's best friend are encouraging, yet Ella is not receptive to uncovering the mystery of her disturbing mother. The author has many sailing metaphors reminding Ella's father's parenting and that apply to her grieving now.I live in the PNW and many of the places mentioned were familiar.

[Clare O'Dea · Rating 4 out of 5]

A difficult story of grief and trauma told with great skill and sensitivity. The writing is intense and lyrical at the same time. I found the characters and setting very original and the childhood flashbacks vivid and compelling. Unfurled is unlike anything else I've read this year and it will stay with me. So many lovely touches, especially the scenes with animals and the father-daughter bond through sailing.

[Stobby · Rating 3 out of 5]

Michelle Bailout-Jones is without doubt a talented writer. The scene on the ferry was, for me, the highlight of this book. Tense, hilarious and unexpected. But I struggled. I gave the book 3 stars because I didn't like the protagonist and most of the book is about her feelings. Yes, bad things happen but these were not the worst of them. She came across as self-indulgent. She also didn't seem to have any friends, so I can't be the only one.

[Nancy · Rating 4 out of 5]

It took me a while to get into this one, but, once I did, I really appreciated the writing and the emotions. The setting is perfect, even though I did get lost at times with the nautical language which I couldn’t even seem to find with google. I loved the plot, and there’s so much to discuss. It would be a great book club choice.

[Heidi Goehmann · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book bravely addresses the complex emotions and family dynamics when one parent has a persistent mental health diagnosis. I appreciated that the author allowed the heroine space for wrestling with both her childhood experiences and her adult concerns, ideas, and struggles of her own. This book is also a book about grief and growth, family secrets and safety.

[Michelle Bailat-Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'd better like it, I wrote it ; )

[Joyce · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was depressing me reading this. Had an ok ending

[Ruth · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars
It took me quite awhile to get really interested in this story. The book had some good points but in all honesty it took forever to get there. The chapters nearer the end were better.

[Marina Sofia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautifully and sensitively written.

[Hannah Price · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sometimes novels are just a sorry excuse for not finishing a story…smh

[Smithereens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Grief and mental illness are no easy subjects, but it’s not a harrowing read, because the writer treats all her characters with love and respect. Bailat-Jones’ love for words is obvious, especially when she crafts scenes with animals or the ocean, and she managed to make me care. I was in Ella’s head and I could see the world through her eyes, and I was sorry to let her go at the end of the book.

Read the rest of my review at Smithereens

[Sue · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ella loved her mother but also had great dislike for her. When her mom simply left the family, Ella became totally attached to her father. When her dad dies, she finds evidence that her mother may have been on the edges of her life thanks to Ella’s father. This book explores her grief, her anger and her love.

[Bookmuseuk]

The title struck me first as an umbrella - a tightly wound spiky bat-like device to be unfurled when the rain comes in. But the reading of this beautiful novel led me to sails, and the thought that only when the wind fills them is motion possible.


Ella's mother left them years ago, in the grip of a mental illness. She hardly thinks of her at all. She has her dad, her anchor and ferryman; her job as a vet; and her rock, husband Neil. Now she is expecting a child of her own and motherhood is her next challenge.
After a sudden accident kills her father, Ella is undone. All the more so when she discovers her mother and father maintained contact over the years. She questions the story of her life and her understanding of who she is.


This is a gracefully written novel which packs a huge punch. Grief, identity and acceptance of change are bundled up into this atmospheric story of how one woman grows to interpret and understand her role in the story of her life.

Bailat-Jones writes with elegance and precision, much like a ballet dancer, using imagery of sea, storms, knots and a sailor's respect for the ocean. But like a dancer, the artistry comes from strength. One of the loveliest and most haunting books I've read this year.