Great Circle

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A TODAY SHOW #ReadWithJenna BOOK CLUB PICK • WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION NOMINEE • The unforgettable story of a daredevil female aviator determined to chart her own course in life; at any cost: an “epic trip—through Prohibition and World War II; from Montana to London to present-day Hollywood—and you’ll relish every minute” (People). After being rescued as infants from a sinking ocean liner in 1914; Marian and Jamie Graves are raised by their dissolute uncle in Missoula; Montana. There--after encountering a pair of barnstorming pilots passing through town in beat-up biplanes--Marian commences her lifelong love affair with flight. At fourteen she drops out of school and finds an unexpected and dangerous patron in a wealthy bootlegger who provides a plane and subsidizes her lessons; an arrangement that will haunt her for the rest of her life; even as it allows her to fulfill her destiny: circumnavigating the globe by flying over the North and South Poles. A century later; Hadley Baxter is cast to play Marian in a film that centers on Marian's disappearance in Antarctica. Vibrant; canny; disgusted with the claustrophobia of Hollywood; Hadley is eager to redefine herself after a romantic film franchise has imprisoned her in the grip of cult celebrity. Her immersion into the character of Marian unfolds; thrillingly; alongside Marian's own story; as the two women's fates--and their hunger for self-determination in vastly different geographies and times--collide. Epic and emotional; meticulously researched and gloriously told; Great Circle is a monumental work of art; and a tremendous leap forward for the prodigiously gifted Maggie Shipstead.