Critical Praise

“An engrossing, believable, gracefully written family drama that reveals our past’s bare-knuckle grip on our present.”

—Emma Donoghue, New York Times bestselling author of ROOM

“A stunning debut by Jan Ellison…Like the photograph that arrives in the mail and sets in motion the plot of this gorgeous novel, A SMALL INDISCRETION reminds us of the intensity of youthful desire and of the fragile nature of a marriage built on secrecy.”

—Ann Packer, New York Times bestselling author of THE DIVE FROM CLAUSEN’S PIER

“It might be convenient if our mistakes would fade with time rather than hunt us down complete with consequence, but that wouldn’t make for the kind of taut, hypnotic story Jan Ellison tells. The impact of narrator Annie Black’s ‘small’ indiscretion is anything but, and in a brilliantly paced unraveling, Ellison makes vivid the sometimes tragic interplay of choice and fate, lust and love, youth and adulthood --- which can bring its own mistakes. Absorbing, chilling, and moving, A SMALL INDISCRETION is the debut of an elegant writer who will be known and admired from the start.”

—Robin Black, author of LIFE DRAWING