Unfinished Acts of Wild Creation eBook by Sarah Yahm

$7.99

Following a tight-knit, eccentric Jewish family, the Rosenbergs, over four decades, Unfinished Acts of Wild Creation combines the madness of motherhood with the manic absurdity of grief in a stunning tale for fans of Allegra Goodman and Rebecca Makkai.

The night after fleeing her mother’s funeral, cellist Louise Rackoff meets aspiring therapist Leon Rosenberg at a Rosh Hashanah dinner in 1974. Over the next two decades, they build a marriage and a family based on honesty, argument, and a shared appreciation of the absurd. But that rock-solid foundation crumbles when Louise is diagnosed with a rare degenerative disease—the same one responsible for her mother's slow, agonizing passing.

Determined to spare Leon and their daughter Lydia from her messy decline, Louise makes the simultaneously selfish and altruistic decision to leave her family and die on her own terms. Her disappearance forces the Rosenbergs to grapple with how to find meaning in the face of mortality—a manic and mystical quest that sends them careening across the globe, colliding into tattoo artists, Chasidic Jews, playworkers, and witches. And finally, back into each other.

Bursting with humor and heartbreak, and inspired by Yahm's own experience as a disabled author facing the existential terror of parenting while ill, Unfinished Acts of Wild Creation leaps into the trials of motherhood, the impossibility of adolescence, the hopelessness of grief, and all the wild beauty and hilarity that makes life worth living anyway.

Publication Date: May 6, 2025
ebook
ISBN: 9781938603440

Following a tight-knit, eccentric Jewish family, the Rosenbergs, over four decades, Unfinished Acts of Wild Creation combines the madness of motherhood with the manic absurdity of grief in a stunning tale for fans of Allegra Goodman and Rebecca Makkai.

The night after fleeing her mother’s funeral, cellist Louise Rackoff meets aspiring therapist Leon Rosenberg at a Rosh Hashanah dinner in 1974. Over the next two decades, they build a marriage and a family based on honesty, argument, and a shared appreciation of the absurd. But that rock-solid foundation crumbles when Louise is diagnosed with a rare degenerative disease—the same one responsible for her mother's slow, agonizing passing.

Determined to spare Leon and their daughter Lydia from her messy decline, Louise makes the simultaneously selfish and altruistic decision to leave her family and die on her own terms. Her disappearance forces the Rosenbergs to grapple with how to find meaning in the face of mortality—a manic and mystical quest that sends them careening across the globe, colliding into tattoo artists, Chasidic Jews, playworkers, and witches. And finally, back into each other.

Bursting with humor and heartbreak, and inspired by Yahm's own experience as a disabled author facing the existential terror of parenting while ill, Unfinished Acts of Wild Creation leaps into the trials of motherhood, the impossibility of adolescence, the hopelessness of grief, and all the wild beauty and hilarity that makes life worth living anyway.

Publication Date: May 6, 2025
ebook
ISBN: 9781938603440

 ADVANCE PRAISE FOR UNFINISHED ACTS OF WILD CREATION

“An extraordinary novel about the inescapability of family patterns—some of which can be reversed, but all of which leave indelible marks—the story holds Louise and Leon’s love for their daughter, and her love for them, at its incandescent center…Devastating and unforgettable, UNFINISHED ACTS OF WILD CREATION is a celebration of unabashed family love.”

––Foreword Reviews, starred review

"Sarah Yahm's debut novel is a pulse of energy, a current of light, a harmonic hum expressed through the unforgettable story of the Rosenbergs: Leon, Louise, and their daughter, Lydia...Unfinished Acts of Wild Creation is full of beauty and intelligence, showcasing Yahm's confident prose and wry humor." 

––Shelf Awareness

“Spanning four decades, their journey is one of reckoning and renewal, forcing each to balance honoring the past with finding a way forward. Yahm weaves a raw, intimate portrait of a family fractured by illness yet forever connected, exploring grief, love, and the painful beauty of letting go.” 

–Booklist

“Unfin­ished Acts of Wild Cre­ation is a bit­ing and heart­break­ing work of fic­tion. Book­end­ed by mor­tal­i­ty and renew­al, the sto­ry spans forty years as it traces one fam­i­ly’s bat­tle with an unnamed, incur­able hered­i­tary dis­ease — with ample neu­ro­sis and dark laughs along the way…Like those of many great nov­el­ists, Yah­m’s con­cerns are both inti­mate and expan­sive. Her sen­tences have teeth.”

–The Jewish Book Council

"Sometimes spiky, often tender, UNFINISHED ACTS OF WILD CREATION is an intergenerational tale that unravels across the habits and history of a memorable Jewish family. I felt as at home in its pages as I do at my own kitchen table."

––Lauren Grodstein, author of WE MUST NOT THINK OF OURSELVES

"This sweeping family saga gripped me from the very first sentence. Narrated with restless intelligence and cast with thorny intellectuals, Yahm's timely debut beautifully interrogates the way illness can dictate the confines of our lives, down to the smallest, most intimate moments."

––Joanna Rakoff, author of MY SALINGER YEAR and A FORTUNATE AGE

“UNFINISHED ACTS OF WILD CREATION is one of the funniest, truest novels I’ve read in years. It’s a raw and unflinching portrait of a contemporary Jewish family in free-fall, one that is recognizable but also genuinely new. Buckle up and enjoy this ride.”

––Jess Row, author of THE NEW EARTH and YOUR FACE IN MINE

"With humor and energy to burn, Sarah Yahm’s poised debut novel UNFINISHED ACTS OF WILD CREATION introduces readers to a wonderfully messy family that's forced to grapple with matters of the body and the spirit."

––Aaron Hamburger, author of HOTEL CUBA

"A smart, darkly funny, and fascinating novel about how people move through time and space, brought together by love and affection and torn apart by loss."

–Alan Grostephan, author of THE BANANA WARS

"A beautiful and emotionally powerful story of love, family, and religious and cultural identity...I'm happy to have discovered in Sarah Yahm a wonderful new storyteller, who we should all keep an eye on in the years to come!"

–Mark Dunn, author of ELLA MINNOW PEE

 ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sarah Yahm has worked as an educator, oral historian, documentarian, and writer. She’s taught at colleges and universities, and in public parks and elementary schools. She’s published in Slate, Bellevue Literary Review, and placed pieces on NPR and affiliates, among others. In her work as a writer and an academic, she’s focused on the lived experience and social meaning of illness and disability. She lives in the woods in Central Vermont with her family.

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