Staff Review: WESTWARD WOMEN

WESTWARD WOMEN by Alice Martin
9781250375308
3/10/26
St. Martin’s Press
Fiction / Literary / Women

Alice Martin’s debut, WESTWARD WOMEN, is a cautionary and speculative thriller that begins in 1973 with a culture-altering event: a strange illness spreading across the nation, afflicting only women. The illness strips them of their memories, plagues them with relentless itching that goes bone deep, and creates a compulsive, overwhelming need to leave their lives behind and journey west. The migrating women then either disappear, make a miraculous recovery, or are tragically claimed by the Pacific.

The story follows three interconnected women propelled by different motives. Accommodating Aimee, “always doing what other people tell her to do,” heads West to track down her closest friend; Teenie, infected with the sickness, accepts a ride west from a mysterious man in a van; and Eve, a journalist, is on the hunt for a career-defining story to prove her worth. All three are on the brink of transformation, drawn to the unknown in search of a way forward. 

This is the ultimate hypnotic road trip thriller with a timely feminist twist. The expertly handled multiple POVs kept me eagerly searching for the hidden connections between the three women and the evocative settings are instantly memorable. This story is terrifying in the best ways, perfectly capturing the collective female restlessness and scratching that primal itch of hunger for more than the life they were given. This is a riveting, high-concept story that reads like both a unique twist and an instant classic.

If you are looking for a riveting story that blends thriller, women’s fiction, and the life-threatening speculative illness of STATION ELEVEN, then this is for you.

Anchor

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“Alice Martin has written a warmly engaging parable about young women who become ‘infected’ with a mysterious virus that leads them to abandon their homes and travel westward—to uncertain destinies. Set in America in the waning years of the Vietnam War, ending in near-contemporary times, WESTWARD WOMEN has an air of prophecy enhanced by its close attentiveness to the intimate lives of girls and women. An audacious first novel to set beside Margaret Atwood’s provocative first novel THE EDIBLE WOMAN.”—Joyce Carol Oates

“This taut and shocking debut is part Western, part zombie thriller, and all cautionary tale about what happens when women’s bodies and desires are marginalized for too long. With twists you won’t see coming, Martin weaves an alternate history that’s only too relevant today.”—Anna North, New York Times bestselling author of OUTLAWED