The Things We Never Say (2026)
The Things We Never Say is set in Strout’s familiar New England, but with an entirely new cast of characters. It follows Artie Dam, a high school history teacher in his late 50s, in the months leading up to the 2024 US presidential election. Artie is married to Evie, a therapist who comes from a different social background, and they have an adult son named Rob. Some time prior to the events of the book, Rob was the driver in a car accident that killed his girlfriend; although he survived, he has been withdrawn and somewhat distant ever since. Artie himself is depicted as experiencing severe internal isolation, is emotionally disconnected from Evie, and is distressed by thoughts of the potential impact of the upcoming election. The weight of all of these concerns lead him to thoughts of suicide.
The Persians (2025)
The Persians focuses on the women from three generations of a wealthy and prestigious Iranian family, the Valiats, whose life paths bifurcated around the time of the Islamic Revolution. While sisters Shirin and Seema left (along with their brother, partners and Seema’s daughter Bita) for the USA, the family’s matriarch Elizabeth stayed behind in their homeland, as did - in more unusual circumstances - Shirin’s then six-year-old daughter Niaz.
The Safekeep (2024)
The Safekeep begins in the early 1960s in the rural Dutch province of Overijssel. We meet the book’s central character, Isabel, who lives alone in her family home, following her mother’s death. She obsessively tends to the house, while knowing she is only a temporary occupant. The house will eventually pass to her elder brother Louis, who like her other brother Hendrick has no interest in living in the house, having left and embraced city life. The three siblings meet for a dinner early in the book, at which Louis introduces his latest girlfriend Eva, to whom Isabel is openly and viciously rude. When Louis is later called away for work, he insists that Eva stay in the family home with Isabel, much to the latter’s dismay.
Instructions for a Heatwave (2014)
Instructions for a Heatwave is set during the UK’s record-breaking 1976 heatwave and drought. It focuses on an Irish family, led by Gretta and Robert Riordan, who moved to London and raised three children, who have all now left home.. Robert goes out one morning for a newspaper and mysteriously disappears, which is the impetus for a re-grouping of the remaining family members, all of whom are dealing with their own issues and harbouring secrets.