* LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD IN FICTION * A NEW YORK Occasions 100 Well known BOOKS OF 2019 SELECTION * ONE OF Period’S 10 BEST NOVELS OF THE ENTIRE YEAR * ONE OF WASHINGTON POST’S 50 Ideal BOOKS OF 2019 * ONE OF O Newspaper’S BEST BOOKS OF 2019 * AMONG NPR’S Ideal BOOKS OF 2019 *

“A profound deep breathing on the nature of reality…An extraordinary and dazzlingly original work from one of our most gifted and interesting authors.” —EMILY ST. JOHN MANDEL, writer of Station Eleven

“Phillips is, seeing that about THE NECESSITY always, doing something simultaneously wildly her own and utterly primal. Maybe it doesn’t surprise me the strangest reserve I’ve find out about motherhood can be the best, nonetheless it does thrill me.” —REBECCA MAKKAI, author of The Great Believers

“Spellbinding…both unsettling and amazing. Phillips manifests the surreal, terrifying, and visceral connection with motherhood.” —DANA SPIOTTA, writer of Innocents yet others

“Like parenthood itself, The Need is frightening and maddening and filled with dark comedy… Everyday life, here, is both tedious and fascinating, grotesque and lovely, familiar and tremendously strange.” —THE BRAND NEW YORK TIMES Publication REVIEW (EDITORS’ CHOICE)

“[A]n extraordinary article writer at her electrifying best.” —Web publishers Regular (STARRED REVIEW)

When Molly, home only with her two small children, hears footsteps in the living space, she tries to convince herself it’s the rest deprivation. She’s been hearing stuff these days. Startling at noisy sounds. Imagining the worst-case scenario. It’s what moms do, she knows.

But then the footsteps come again, and she catches a glance of movement.

Instantly Molly finds herself face-to-face with an intruder who has learned far too very much about her and her family members. As she efforts to protect those she loves most, Molly must also acknowledge her personal frailty. Molly slips down an existential rabbit hole where she must confront the dualities of motherhood: the ecstasy and the dread; the languor as well as the ferocity; the banality and the transcendence as the reserve hurtles toward a mind-bending bottom line.

In The Need, Helen Phillips has created a subversive, speculative thriller that involves life through blazing, arresting prose and gorgeous, haunting imagery. Helen Phillips has been anointed among the most thrilling fiction writers operating today, and THE NECESSITY is definitely a glorious celebration from the bizarre and gorgeous nature of our everyday lives.