When I Ran Away

December 15, 2020
A homesick New Yorker suffering from postpartum depression completely loses it in London. We meet Gigi in the middle of the second-worst day of her life, a Wednesday in August 2016, when she walks out on her husband and two children, all three screaming and crying, and checks into the Grand Euro Star Lodge Hotel, where she will drink wine, watch her beloved Real Housewives of New Jersey, and try to shove her body into what the English call a "half bathtub." The next section of the book revisits what was surely the actual worst day of her life, Sept. 11, 2001: Her only sibling was at an interview in one of the towers. The one redeeming factor of that day was that she met Harry, a kind and elegant Brit who became her future husband, on the Staten Island Ferry. Fate keeps them apart for quite a while, and by the time they meet again, Gigi is raising a child--her dead brother's dead girlfriend's son. This time, they seal the deal, and before long Staten Island Gigi is installed in a posh house in London where she is miserable beyond belief. The older boy, Johnny, goes to a fancy private school where Gigi feels completely out of place (her class consciousness and awareness of other women's clothing, accoutrements, and bodies is acute), and her new baby, Rocky, is the product of a Caesarian birth so traumatic that she is more or less destroyed, emotionally and physically. How much can one woman take? That is the question this novel asks, furiously, impatiently, and without too many niceties of plot. The author's bio, perfectly parallel to Gigi's at least in the outlines, suggests that Bannister's impulse is autobiographical; who could or would make this up? Gigi is sharp and funny and endearing enough that you will want to stick with her through the whole nightmare, as if she needed you to hold her hand. A searing account of the pain and rage motherhood can sometimes produce.

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January 18, 2021
Bannister’s emotionally raw debut offers an unflinching glimpse of new motherhood. When readers first encounter native New Yorker Gigi Harrison in London, she’s leaving her English husband, Harry, and their two young children for a seedy hotel. In between answering texts from an increasingly panicked Harry, Gigi gradually recounts what made her leave Harry, starting with their first encounter 15 years before on the Staten Island Ferry, as both were fleeing Manhattan on 9/11. Harry’s kindness after Gigi and her working-class family learn her 19-year-old brother, Frankie, died in the attack endears him to her, but the two eventually lose touch. In 2012, when their paths cross again, Gigi has become an adoptive mom to Johnny, the infant son of Frankie’s former girlfriend. Gigi and Harry fall in love, and Gigi reluctantly follows Harry back to London and into an increasingly lonely realm of homesickness and functional alcoholism, especially after the traumatic birth of their son. Some of Gigi’s musings read like a retread of the “mummy wars” debates, as she reflects on a friend who lost her career after having a child, but Bannister effectively captures Gigi’s awareness of cultural and class divides. This poignant story feels genuine. Agent: Alice Lutyens, Curtis Brown Group.

February 15, 2021
It was shockingly easy for Gigi to walk out on her husband and two sons. She reached inside the overstuffed diaper bag for her keys and wallet, walked to a seedy motel, and paid a little extra for early check-in. It got tougher once she zoned out in front of a Real Housewives marathon, and started reflecting on her life. She relives how the tragedy of 9/11 sparked a connection with her now-husband, how her adopted son's earliest days were marked by addiction, and how she didn't think her heart could expand to love one more person until she gave birth to Rocky. As Gigi contemplates her next move, she realizes she's pushed herself aside to make room for the ones she loves, and wonders if it's too late to bring herself back. A thematic companion to Kiley Reid's Such a Fun Age (2019), Bannister's novel is a searing insight into the complexities of motherhood and the interminable frustration of the tiny needs, musts, and wants that keep a family moving. A gripping, introspective read.

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