Francine Prose

Hunters and Gatherers: A Novel Francine Prose

A witty and wry satire of New Age searchers, our spiritual longings, and our earthbound natures Martha is thirty, and her life has stalled. Her last boyfriend turned cruel long before he left her, her fact-checking job is underpaying and unfulfilling, and the aimlessness of her twenties-which she thought was just a phase-has become her defining characteristic. She is wandering along the beach when she spies a group of women performing a strange spiritual ceremony that stirs something deep within her. With names like Isis Moonwagon and Hegwitha, they have given themselves fully to the worship of the Goddess. After Martha earns an honored place in their budding religion, she gets to know its members and finds that the New Age has some of the same problems as the old one.