little scratch

A Novel

By: Rebecca Watson

Narrated by: Ell Potter, Elizabeth Knowelden, PJ Ochlan, Steve West

"Extraordinary" (The New Yorker)

In the formally innovative tradition of Grief Is the Thing with Feathers and Ducks, Newburyport comes a dazzlingly original, shot-in-the-arm of a debut that reveals a young woman's every thought over the course of one deceptively ordinary day.

She wakes up, goes to work. Watches the clock and checks her phone. But underneath this monotony there's something else going on: Something under her skin.

Relayed in interweaving columns that chart the feedback loop of memory, the senses, and modern distractions with wit and precision, our narrator becomes increasingly anxious as the day moves on: Is she overusing the heart emoji? Isn't drinking eight glasses of water a day supposed to fix everything? Why is the etiquette of the women's bathroom be so fraught? How does she define rape? And why can't she stop scratching?

Fiercely moving and slyly profound, Little Scratch is a defiantly playful look at how our minds function in - and survive - the darkest moments.

©2020 Rebecca Watson (P)2020 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

"Technology is affecting the way we think, and Rebecca Watson’s little scratch is a novel that captures this.... Watson lets the words flow, jumbled and urgent as our thoughts are, like Kerouac and his scrolls.... This isn’t a long book; that’s part of how the author is able to pull it off.... But it charms. The book’s unconventional strategy fell away as I read; I cared about the narrator as one does a well-drawn character. She scratches at her skin throughout the book, and eventually I felt it." (The New Republic)

"The unnamed narrator of this debut novel is an Everywoman...The physical form of the narrative reproduces the experience of the woman's scattered thoughts... which overlap, interrupt each other, merge, and battle in the saturated “now” of the book’s overwhelming immediacy. The result is an unusual reading experience which relates both the mundane and the revelatory...A daring book whose innovations are balanced by the sad familiarity of its pain." (Kirkus review)

"An inventive, immersive debut... Watson’s clever convention and set pieces are not simply flourishes but integral to the plot and themes... A haunting, virtuosic performance." (Publishers Weekly, starred review)