Acute empathy and insight ... I have never read a more informed and vividly rendered account of Peter’s daunting profession ... Documents an emotional odyssey that in the end feels satisfying and real, and Haslett’s account of Peter’s life is unparalleled in its portrayal of a worker on the front lines of our immigration wars buckling under the weight of his burden.
Masterful ... Adam Haslett’s storytelling skill...is on quietly magnificent display as Peter, slowly then more precipitously, begins to come undone ... The momentum of the novel builds as long-held misunderstandings and resentments come to the surface, illuminating the meaning of what it means to be a mother, and a son, and culminating with a great sense of a weight lifted, of lightness and air.
Haslett, who is one of the most psychologically astute fiction writers in America, complicates this novel beautifully ... There’s a strange tension in Haslett’s work between urgency and introspection. Try as you might, you cannot rush this novel. It will inevitably slacken your pace — not with boredom, but with wariness. His prose lies on the page with the intensity of a loosely coiled copperhead.
The prose is especially fine during Ann’s lengthy meditation sessions, in which Haslett reveals his expert sense of his characters ... Well-paced and elegantly written, Haslett’s latest is a haunting work.
Haslett has wisely concentrated his gifts, choosing to give only the perspectives of Peter and Ann, who have been estranged for many years. He has also embraced his predilection for back story by making the narratives people tell to explain themselves the subject of the novel itself ... Mothers and Sons is Haslett’s best novel. By limiting his area of inquiry, he achieves new levels of moral depth and narrative push. But he has not escaped old problems; in some ways he has entrenched them ... Everything fits, too neatly and tightly.
Superb, character-driven ... The characters come alive on the page, commanding readers’ attention. This novel is sure to receive accolades, and it richly deserves them.
He demonstrates once again his ability to produce graceful, emotionally affecting fiction whose characters’ struggles seem as real as those of people we know in our own lives ... Haslett’s prose is simultaneously efficient and evocative, so that the pleasures of this touching novel extend well beyond those that flow from engaging with a psychologically astute and well-told story.
Though the outlines of the novel suggest sentimental family-trauma fare, Haslett’s sophisticated grasp of the ways that people over-police their feelings makes it a remarkably acute and effective character study. A family-in-crisis story that keenly captures deep-seated fears and regrets.
