The Hundred-Year House (37 page)
Read The Hundred-Year House Online
Authors: Rebecca Makkai
Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Historical, #Literary
Oh Violet, Violet, Violet!
He wants to shout it, but he won’t.
Let me in.
Let me in.
Let me in.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This is a novel about, among other things, how much artists need a community. These are a few of the communities that have sheltered me during the writing of this book:
The wonderful people of Viking and Penguin: Kathryn Court, Lindsey Schwoeri, Scott Cohen, Veronica Windholz, Nina Hnatov, Nancy Resnick, and Kristen Haff; as well as Josh Cochran, who gave Laurelfield the red sky it needed.
The stupendous Nicole Aragi (the Queen of Pentacles) and Duvall Osteen.
A phalanx of early editors: the writers M. Molly Backes, Alex Christensen, John Copenhaver, Tim Horvath, Brian Prisco, and Emily Gray Tedrowe; and the readers (the world needs more readers like them) Shelley Gentle, Margaret Kelley, and Pamela Minkler.
The friends who let me bother them about technical details (and aren’t responsible for my errors): the writer David M. Harris on series ghostwriting; the writer Margaret Zamos-Monteith and the photographer Matthew Monteith on photographic history and 1920s darkrooms; Edward McEneely on WWII history (so much work for so few words!); and my social media hive-mind for everything from the drying time of oil paint to oak stump decomposition to pry bars.
The Sewanee Writers’ Conference, where the first chapters were encouraged, and where Christine Schutt’s kind read convinced me to keep working on this book.
The colleges on Chicago’s North Shore that have been kind enough, in the time since I originally drafted the first part of this novel, to welcome me to campus or let me teach. The college in this book is explicitly
not
based on any of those institutions.
The Ragdale Foundation and The Corporation of Yaddo, and everyone I met at both, whose work–from sonnets to paintings to smashed teacups–has inspired my last few years. What sort of world would this be, without refuges?
My family–Jon, Lydia, Heidi, Mom–who have been, variously, great editors and/or less requiring of diaper changes than they were three years ago.
Also, all five of the people I’ve forgotten.
This book started as a short story about male anorexia. I have no idea what the hell
happened.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
IN THE FIELD: THE TRIBE
ZILLA IN HER STUDIO
SAMANTHA IN THE KITCHEN
LUDO AND JOSEPHINE ON THE LAWN
WHAT WE’VE GLEANED FROM MARLON
EDDIE IN THE LIBRARY
FRIDAY, 10:16 A.M.
SAMANTHA IN HER ROOMS
THE DISH ON MARCELINE
ZILLA IN THE ATTIC
VIKTOR IN HIS STUDIO: THE WINTER’S TALE
FRIDAY, 1:00
ARMAND AND EDDIE IN THE FLOWERED BEDROOM
THE WHITE RABBITS APPRAISE GAMBY
EDDIE AT DINNER
MARCELINE AT THE END OF THE WORLD
ALL OF THEM
ZILLA IN THE DARKROOM, GAMBY IN THE DARK
THE GHOSTS
SAMANTHA AT HER WINDOW