Books by Erica McKeen

A GLOBE AND MAIL BEST BOOK OF 2022A reclamation of female rage and a horrifyingly deformed Bildungsroman.Frances is quiet and reclusive, so much so that her upstairs roommates sometimes forget she exists. Isolated in the basement, and on the brink of graduating from university, Frances herself starts to question the realities of her own existence. She cant remember there being a lock on the door at the top of the basement stairsand yet, when she turns the knob, the door wont open. She cant tell the difference between her childhood memories, which bloom like flowers in the dark basement, and herdreams. Worse still, she cant ignore the very real tapping sound nowcominginsistently, violentlythreatening to break through her bedroom wall.With the thematic considerations of Mary Shelley and Shirley Jacksons work, and in the style of Herta Mller and Daisy Johnson, Tearis both a horrifyingly deformed Bildungsroman and a bristling reclamation of female rage. Blurring the real and the imagined, this lyric debut novel unflinchingly engages with contemporary feminist issues and explores the detrimental effects of false narratives, gaslighting, and manipulation on young women.