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A searing debut novel from the award-winning author of You Know When the Men are Gone, about jealousy, the unpredictable path of friendship, and the secrets kept in marriage, all set within the U.S. expat community of the Middle East during the rise of the Arab Spring.

“A gripping, cleverly plotted novel with surprising bite.”—Phil Klay

“Mesmerizing and devastating...two military wives must explore a modern-day, cultural labyrinth in this insatiable read.”—Sarah McCoy

Both Cassie Hugo and Margaret Brickshaw dutifully followed their soldier husbands to the U.S. embassy in Jordan, but that’s about all the women have in common. After two years, Cassie’s become an expert on the rules, but newly arrived Margaret sees only her chance to explore. So when a fender-bender sends Margaret to the local police station, Cassie reluctantly agrees to watch Margaret’s toddler son. But as the hours pass, Cassie’s boredom and frustration turn to fear: Why isn’t Margaret answering her phone, and why is it taking so long to sort out a routine accident? Snooping around Margaret’s apartment, Cassie begins to question not only her friend’s whereabouts but also her own role in Margaret’s disappearance. 

With achingly honest prose and riveting characters, The Confusion of Languages plunges readers into a shattering collision between two women and two worlds, affirming Siobhan Fallon as a powerful voice in American fiction and a storyteller not to be missed.

#FirstLine ~ We are close, so close, to Margaret's apartment, and I feel myself sink deeper into the passenger seat, relieved that I have succeeded in my small mission of getting Margaret out of her home, if only for a few hours.

Such an amazing story that leaves the reader feeling a bit off center in a good way.  Fallon has found a way to reveal the cracks in love, marriage and friendship and so much more, but she did so flawlessly.  There is a meaningful story wrapped with humanity and its complexities and everyday living.  A beautiful blend of truth that was plotted perfectly and allowed the reader to feel deeply the story within the pages.

Siobhan Fallon is the author of the 2012 PEN Center USA Literary Award in Fiction winner You Know When the Men Are Gone. She is also the recipient of the 2012 Indies Choice Honor Award and the Texas Institute of Letters Award for First Fiction. Her writing has appeared in The Washington Post Magazine, Woman’s Day, Good Housekeeping, Military Spouse, The Huffington Post, and NPR’s Morning Edition, among others. She was raised in Highland Falls, New York, just outside the gates of the United States Military Academy at West Point. She graduated from Providence College and spent a year at Cambridge University in England. After teaching English in Japan, she earned an MFA at the New School in New York City. She and her family moved to Jordan in 2011, and they currently live in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.

Her new novel, THE CONFUSION OF LANGUAGES, out on shelves June 2017, can be pre-ordered now.

For more about Siobhan, please go to: www.siobhanfallon.com

"...gripping, straight-up, no-nonsense stories" The New York Times

"There is the war we know - from Hollywood and CNN- and then there is the battleground at home depicted by breakout author Siobhan Fallon, an army wife with...a staggering arsenal of talent, her sentences popping like small arm fire, her stories scaring a gasp out of you like tracer rounds burning in the night sky over your home town."

- Benjamin Percy, author of The Wilding, Refresh, Refresh, and The Language of Elk

"In this poignant and beautiful collection of linked stories, Siobhan Fallon has created a world of characters we need to know. These are our wounded, our courageous, our disheartened, our cynical and our brave. You won't read these stories on the front pages of the newspaper, but still they feel like a news flash about the emotional toll of war. YOU KNOW WHEN THE MEN ARE GONE delivers to us the inner lives of families who fight for our country while fighting their deepest fears and demons. This is a brave and illuminating book."

-- Dani Shapiro, author of Devotion

"Siobhan Fallon's YOU KNOW WHEN THE MEN ARE GONE is a haunting elegy

to those who bear the real burden when our nation goes to war: spouses and children left behind. She writes with the authority of hard-earned experience, and this collection of stories has much to teach us all."

-Nathaniel Fick, author of One Bullet Away: The Making of a Marine Officer

"What a fascinating, rare glimpse into the domesticity of war. This is a wonderful debut. Each beautifully rendered story is braced with intelligence and wisdom."

-Jill Ciment, author of Heroic Measures

"Siobhan Fallon is a remarkable debut author whose first collection of short stories, YOU KNOW WHEN THE MEN ARE GONE, signals the debut of a new American talent. I was drawn into a world I had never seen before, and found heartache, courage, and laughter there."

- Jean Kwok, author of Girl in Translation

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