The Almost Moon
Alice Sebold
 Artist's model and divorcee, Helen Knightly spontaneously murders her mother, an agoraphobic now suffering from severe dementia, by suffocating her with a towel. But while her act is almost unconscious, it also seems like the fulfilment of a long-cherished, buried desire, since she spent a lifetime trying to win the love of a mother who had none to spare. Over the next twenty-four hours, Helen recalls her childhood, youth, marriage, and motherhood. Her life and the omnipresent relationship with her mother rush in at her as she confronts the choices that have brought her to that crossroads. Partly absent-mindedly, partly desperately she tries to conceal her crime, and in doing so ropes her ex-husband into the conspiracy.