LLL Presents Boo Trundle & Christie Henry – “The Daughter Ship: A Novel”

Boo Trundle’s irreverent debut delivers a headlong human comedy of trauma and triumph, narrated by the concealed inner selves of a woman on the brink. Princeton University Press’s Director, Christie Henry, will join the author in conversation.

Katherine is a lost creative soul and suburban mother of two, who has struggled into her forties with the urge to self-harm. She is comfortably married, and longs to overcome her dark thoughts and intermittent fears of sexual intimacy. This brisk, mesmerizing version of her life is told in alternating short chapters by Truitt, Star, and Smooshed Bug—her inner children, each with their particular strategy for coping with Katherine’s past at the hands of a hopeless mother and a terrifying, seductive father. Several of her female ancestors, Confederate widows and their daughters, who’ve imposed a legacy of racism and damage on her bloodline, also join the telling.

This unforgettable chorus of selves, battling over Katherine’s wellbeing, is unified by their hope for her future, as they collaborate to shape a personal narrative like no other we’ve experienced in fiction.

Boo Trundle is a writer, artist, and performer whose work has appeared across various platforms and publications, including The Brooklyn Rail, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, and NPR’s The Moth. She has released three albums of original music with Big Deal Records. Christie Henry is the visionary Director of Princeton University Press.