Origin, A Novel

Lena Dawson is a fingerprint expert at a crime lab in the small city of Syracuse, New York. Her investigation of a series of crib deaths leads her back to the mystery of her own childhood and the possibility of the inconceivable: that there is an infant murderer at work. With prose as cool as a razor yet as wildly impressionistic as a fever dream, Diana Abu-Jaber takes us deeply into Lena Dawson and her search for a killer that must first begin in the lost forest of her own psyche....
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Lena Dawson is a fingerprint expert at a crime lab in the small city of Syracuse, New York. Her investigation of a series of crib deaths leads her back to the mystery of her own childhood and the possibility of the inconceivable: that there is an infant murderer at work. With prose as cool as a razor yet as wildly impressionistic as a fever dream, Diana Abu-Jaber takes us deeply into Lena Dawson and her search for a killer that must first begin in the lost forest of her own psyche. Origin is a gripping exploration of the elusive nature of identity and one's own remembered past, the innocent and guilty alike. This is a superbly written and utterly compelling novel.-Andre Dubus III, author of House of Sand and Fog