An Atlantic Books Today Editor's Pick

Lorna always wanted to stand out, but her career as a competitive swimmer was cut short by a knee injury. Cara, her daughter, tries hard to blend in, but when she has to fill in for her brother at a school pageant, she is overwhelmed by terror. Lorna is vain about her ability to shut out distractions. Cara can’t control her scary thoughts. And while Lorna tries her best to move past life’s early disappointments, Cara picks at the cracks in her family’s story. Spanning two decades, Catch My Drift follows mother and daughter through life changes big and small, and reveals that despite our shared experiences, we each live a private story.

Genevieve Scott is a graduate of the University of British Columbia’s Creative Writing MFA. Her short fiction has been published in literary journals in Canada and the United Kingdom, including the New Quarterly, the White Wall Review, and the Bristol Short Story Prize Anthology, among others. Her short films have screened at eleven film festivals throughout the US, Canada, England, and Ireland. Genevieve grew up in Toronto and currently lives in Southern California, although she will be returning to Toronto in the spring of 2018. She is a creative writing mentor to at-risk teen girls in Los Angeles with the nonprofit WriteGirl. Catch My Drift is her debut novel.

Genevieve Scott's profile page

"An affecting novel-in-stories whose cleverness and comic moments intersect evocatively with moments of loss and regret."

<i>Toronto Star</i>

"A compelling novel about a mother and daughter."

<i>Consumed by Ink</i>

"A beautiful and bittersweet life story that needs to be on your summer reading list."

<i>Miramichi Reader</i>

"Like the best contemporary novels, Genevieve Scott’s Catch My Drift is alchemical. Scott harnesses the flinty realism and breathtaking prose of short fiction, mixes it with the emotional urgency and scope of a layered intergenerational drama and creates a compelling and thoroughly original portrait of the modern family. Rendered with sensitivity and insight, Catch My Drift is elegant, ambitious and tender, a rare novel in which an entire family comes of age."

Nancy Lee

"An ending I feared would be heartbreaking but ended up being perfect and beautiful."

<i>Pickle Me This</i>

"Genevieve Scott's Catch My Drift is a brilliant novel in linked stories, a mother/daughter tale like none I've read before. Scott writes with a sharp beauty that leaves me not just breathless but wanting more. I love her prose."

Joseph Boyden