Night Watch

Jayne Anne Phillips · b. 1952 · USA

Why it matters

A mother and daughter fleeing Civil War violence in the West Virginia mountains, and a shell-shocked veteran who turns up at the same lunatic asylum where the daughter now works, are revealed through fractured chronology to be bound together. Phillips's Pulitzer winner is patient, elliptical historical fiction.

At a glance

Fractured, nonlinear chronology across multiple perspectives withholds connections until late.