From Publishers Weekly
Prolific Oates (We Were the Mulvaneys; Beast; etc.) explores sexual violence and its aftermath in this taut, harrowing novella. Teena Maguire, a pretty, 30-something widow, is on her way home from a party when she is beaten, gang-raped and left for dead. She survives the attack, which her 12-year-old daughter Bethie witnesses, but as only a husk of her former self ("That pathetic woman," she thinks of herself, "they should have finished the job"). It is to Bethie, then, that the task of caring for her falls: "If Momma could sleep, that was good. It was your duty to let her sleep." Oates draws on shifting, often fragmentary points of view to tell the story of the days before and after the rape, including that of Teena's lover, Ray Casey, whose feelings have changed since the attack; Walt Pick, the father of two of the rapists; Harriet Diebenkorn, the deputy prosecutor who fails Teena in the preliminary hearing; and Bethie, whose affecting chapters are written in the second person. Redemption of a sort is offered in the form of John Dromoor, a young police officer whose concern for Teena is matched by his desire for justice. When a slick Buffalo defense lawyer devastates Teena on the witness stand, Dromoor takes matters into his own hands. This is where the story truly chills, as the attackers fret about their future and Dromoor slowly exacts a cool vengeance. The love story is Bethie's-a haunting affection born of a terrible crime. The effects linger, despite the book's brevity. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.


From Booklist
Men as predators preying on girls and women have always piqued Oates' depthless imagination, and her home ground, beautiful but backward rural New York State, is often the setting for her tales of demented bloodlust. Both elements are present in their starkest and most unnerving forms in this masterfully crafted and diabolically insightful fable about the nearly fatal beating and gang rape of Teena MacGuire on the Fourth of July in the small town of Niagara Falls. Teena and her 12-year-old daughter, Bethel, are walking home from a party when the vicious attack takes place, and Bethel only narrowly escapes her mother's terrible fate. Terrorized but valiant, Bethel identifies their assailants and is determined to testify, but the townspeople close ranks behind the indicted brutes, their sons and brothers, and Teena is assaulted all over again in court. But there is one man on the case who possesses a clear and unshakable sense of justice, and his empathic connection with Bethel is at the heart of this lean and potent tale. Oates' unflinching dramatization of the insidious aftereffects of a horrific crime neatly exposes the underside of family loyalty, dissects the hatred victims attract, and reminds readers that the real power resides in the survivor, not the attacker. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Book Description
Teena Maguire should not have tried to shortcut her way home that Fourth of July. Not after midnight, not through Rocky Point Park. Not the way she was dressed: tank top, denim cut-offs, high-heeled sandals. Not with her twelve-year-old daughter, Bethie. Not with packs of local guys running loose on hormones, rage, and alcohol. A victim of gang rape, left for dead in the park boathouse, the once vital and sexy Teena Maguire can now only regret that she has survived. And Bethie can barely remember a childhood uncolored by fear. For they're not even a neighborhood away, the men that she identified for the Niagara Falls Police Department: the wide-browed, sandy-haired Pick brothers; the sneering Jimmy DeLucca; Fritz Haaber with his moustache and stubbled jaw. They've killed her grandmother's longhaired orange cat. At a relentless, compelling pace punctuated by lonely cries in the night and the whisper of terror in the afternoon, National Book Award-winner Joyce Carol Oates unfolds the story of Teena and Bethie, their assailants, and their unexpected, silent champion, a man who knows the meaning of justice. And love.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"Teena Maguire should not have tried to shortcut her way home that Fourth of July. Not after midnight, not through Rocky Point Park. Not the way she was dressed: tank top, denim cut-offs, high-heeled sandals - like she was asking for it. Not with her twelve-year-old daughter Bethie. Not with packs of local guys running loose on hormones, rage, and alcohol." "A victim of gang rape, left for dead in the park boathouse, the once vivacious, down-to-earth, sexy Teena Maguire can now only regret that she has survived. And Bethie can barely remember a childhood uncolored by fear. For they're not even a neighborhood away, out on bail, the men that she identified for the Niagara Falls Police Department, the wide-browed, sandy-haired Pick brothers; the sneering Jimmy DeLucca; Fritz Haaber with his moustache and stubbled jaw. They've got a hotshot lawyer who's got their charges reduced to simple assault. Bethie is scared; they've killed her grandmother's longhaired orange cat." This gripping new novella from Joyce Carol Oates unfolds the story of Teena and Bethie, of their insolent, cocksure assailants and their silent champion - one man who knows the meaning of justice. And love.

FROM THE CRITICS

The New York Times

… Rape: A Love Story gives us Oates at her darkly enthralling best. — Andrew Ervin

Publishers Weekly

Prolific Oates (We Were the Mulvaneys; Beast; etc.) explores sexual violence and its aftermath in this taut, harrowing novella. Teena Maguire, a pretty, 30-something widow, is on her way home from a party when she is beaten, gang-raped and left for dead. She survives the attack, which her 12-year-old daughter Bethie witnesses, but as only a husk of her former self ("That pathetic woman," she thinks of herself, "they should have finished the job"). It is to Bethie, then, that the task of caring for her falls: "If Momma could sleep, that was good. It was your duty to let her sleep." Oates draws on shifting, often fragmentary points of view to tell the story of the days before and after the rape, including that of Teena's lover, Ray Casey, whose feelings have changed since the attack; Walt Pick, the father of two of the rapists; Harriet Diebenkorn, the deputy prosecutor who fails Teena in the preliminary hearing; and Bethie, whose affecting chapters are written in the second person. Redemption of a sort is offered in the form of John Dromoor, a young police officer whose concern for Teena is matched by his desire for justice. When a slick Buffalo defense lawyer devastates Teena on the witness stand, Dromoor takes matters into his own hands. This is where the story truly chills, as the attackers fret about their future and Dromoor slowly exacts a cool vengeance. The love story is Bethie's-a haunting affection born of a terrible crime. The effects linger, despite the book's brevity. (Jan.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

Revisiting a theme from Oates's We Were the Mulvaneys, this novella examines the aftermath of a gang rape. Teena Maguire and her 12-year-old daughter, Bethie, take a shortcut through the park on their way home from a Fourth of July party. Walking through it, they are chased by a gang of young men, who savagely rape Teena in a boathouse and leave her for dead. Bethie is able to hide and run for help; the assailants are quickly identified and brought to a hearing, but their defense lawyer claims that Teena was asking for it and was even going to get paid. The narrative switches among different characters' voices, but it is Bethie's that emphasizes how that moment formed a dividing line in all their lives. The rape's impact on the perpetrators, Teena's boyfriend, and the investigating cop drive the story to a somewhat hopeful ending. Like Gabriel Garc a M rquez's Chronicle of a Death Foretold, this short work builds in suspense until the final page. Recommended.-Josh Cohen, Mid-Hudson Lib. Syst., Poughkeepsie, NY Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews