The Lunar Housewife

Starred review from April 4, 2022
This cleverly inventive yet authentic–feeling early Cold War thriller from Woods (Fräulein M.) takes on the New York publishing world from a woman’s perspective, while containing a novella-length American-Soviet space romance written by the protagonist with parallels to her own life. In 1953, Louise Leithauser has been pseudonymously writing about politics for a hot new literary magazine cofounded by her boyfriend, Joe Martin, and his charismatic partner, Harry Billings. The role brings her close to publishing celebrities who could be interested in the romance she’s working on, but also forces her into socializing with Harry and the woman he’s dating behind his wife’s back, a waitress who also knows the unglamorous secrets of Louise’s past. Meanwhile, an overheard conversation leads Louise to investigate Joe’s connections to government censorship of literary expression. Real-life writers add spice, including a playfully frank Ernest Hemingway, whom Louise befriends during an interview for which he requests a female reporter. The suspense builds as Woods shifts between the main narrative and the space romance, which provides a window into Louise’s frustrated mindset about gender dynamics, politics, and power. This is a delightfully different variety of spy story. Agent: Shannon Hassan, Marsal Lyon Literary.

April 15, 2022
A young woman navigates the treacherous terrain of Manhattan's early 1950s literary scene. If only Louise, Woods' plucky heroine, had any idea of exactly how treacherous literati can be. A transplant from Ossining, Louise is writing a "romantic fantasy" called The Lunar Housewife, set in an indeterminate but far from post-Soviet future. Chapters from Lunar, the novel within this novel, are interspersed throughout, as Louise writes while trying to negotiate real life in 1953. Pulling off an interview with Ernest Hemingway, she hopes to gain credibility and a byline at Downtown, the new magazine her boyfriend, Joe, and his colleague Harry founded, mixing intellectual commentary with cheesecake, like Playboy or Esquire--although the author's note reveals it's actually based on the Paris Review. The parlance is convincingly of the '50s, and Woods' phrases are well turned. Increasingly, Lunar Housewife tracks Louise's life: Both Louise and her protagonist, Katherine, encounter boyfriends and governments one can't quite trust--Joe may be embroiled with the CIA, and Harry fears that his apartment is bugged. Katherine, an American defector to Soviet Russia, is sent to set up housekeeping on the moon with Sergey, a Soviet army deserter-turned-cosmonaut; as the two fall in love, they are monitored by a "visio-telespeaker." Louise and her creation each become pregnant, which amps up the parallel dangers. Louise's portrayal of Russians as human and Hemingway's putative novel in progress praising Castro might be endangering both authors. (Woods' "Papa" may be a clich�, but he's a scene-stealer.) During this time of the House Un-American Activities Committee, with the Korean War winding down and the Cold War heating up, the Russians appear to be the obvious villains. The truth, as Woods suggests, none too subtly, is more complicated: The U.S. establishment is not just blacklisting artists, but, through violence and/or bribery, censoring any cultural reference that does not glorify American capitalism. A sinister message that may not be all that far-fetched.

COPYRIGHT(2022) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

May 1, 2022
Woods' historical thriller tells two related stories, one about the CIA's audacious plan to use American literature as propaganda against the Soviets, the other about one woman's attempt to escape the cloister in which men are determined to confine her. Louise Leithauser is an aspiring writer in 1950s New York whose articles for a literary magazine, Downtown, based partially on the Paris Review (one of the journals actually funded by the CIA), can only appear under a male pseudonym. On the side, she is writing an SF romance called The Lunar Housewife about a woman who defects to the USSR. Her boyfriend and one of Downtown's editors, Joe Martin (loosely based on Peter Matthiessen), derides her novel and then radically edits her interview with Ernest Hemingway. More examples of not being taken seriously as a writer, or could someone else be pulling a different set of nefarious strings at Downtown? And did Joe's fellow editor really die of an accidental drug overdose? Chunks of the SF novel are interspersed along the way, and while this tactic effectively displays Louise's growing feminist point of view, it tends to pull readers out of the thoroughly fascinating main plot, in which a determined woman spies on suspected spies. The tantalizing slice of literary history, combined with the revealing look at good-old-boy sexism in postwar publishing, will draw readers across multiple genres.

COPYRIGHT(2022) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

May 6, 2022

It's the mid-1950s, and Louise Leithauser is an aspiring novelist who works for Downtown magazine, a Playboy-esque publication featuring stories, interviews, and pin-up photos. She's hardworking, capable, and a skilled writer, but being a woman means not being taken seriously in the sexist world of publishing, and it doesn't help that Joe, one of the magazine's co-editors, is her boyfriend. When she overhears an unusual conversation between Joe and his partner, Harry, her interest is piqued, but when she asks about it, they both stonewall her. Louise finally gets the break she's been waiting for: Ernest Hemingway agrees to an interview, but only if the interviewer is a "girl." Hemingway is surprisingly affable, and their candid conversation about Cuba, communism, and American politics turns into an excellent article--which Joe and his partner Harry edit into a generic, politically neutral puff piece. Soon, Louise is putting together the pieces--and wondering if Joe is working for the CIA. VERDICT Woods (Fraulein M) intersperses chapters from Louise's manuscript throughout her story, giving readers a clear view of how subversive her thoughts and beliefs are. An engrossing tale of a talented young woman longing to break free from the restrictive gender roles of the 1950s; ideal for fans of Anna Pitoniak and Suzanne Rindell.--Nanette Donohue

Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.