The Drowning Girl: A Memoir

A complex, haunting novel that explores a schizophrenic young artist's struggles with her perception of reality… including an intriguing ghostly woman who appears to her in the most mysterious ways.

India Morgan Phelps-Imp to her friends-is trying to write her memoir, but she struggles with the unreliability of her own mind. Suffering from schizophrenia, as well as comorbid anxiety and OCD, Imp has a difficult time separating fantasy from reality. But for her, it's most important to tell her "truth."

And for Imp, that truth comes through a stream-of-consciousness tale of her love story with her transgender girlfriend, as well as Imp's obsession with a mysterious woman whom she finds naked and mute at the side of the road. Imp must push past her mental illness-or work with it-to piece together her memories and tell her story.

A rich exploration of mental illness, gender identity, and creative process, The Drowning Girl delivers an eerie and powerful story of a woman's efforts to discover the truth that's locked away in her own head.

"Caitlìn R. Kiernan moves firmly into the new vanguard […] of our best and most artful authors of the gothic and fantastic-those capable of writing fiction of deep moral and artistic seriousness."-Peter Straub