Here in Avalon

An “enchanting” (Caroline Kepnes, author of You) “fairy-tale-inflected thriller” (The New Yorker) about two sisters who encounter a captivating yet possibly dangerous underworld cult that challenges their perception of reality.

A New Yorker Best Book of 2024

Here in Avalon tells the story of two sisters, Rose and Cecilia, whose lives are as different as night and day. Raised—and often neglected—by a wayward mother in New York City’s chaotic bohemia, Rose has built the stable life she always dreamed of: a good job at a self-help startup, a clean apartment, and an engagement to a stable, if self-satisfied, tech CEO who shares her belief in human potential, hard work, and the sacrifice of childish dreams.

Rose’s sister, Cecilia, is quite the opposite. Irresponsible and impetuous, Cecilia flutters between aspirations, from a European monastery one month to a falcon rescue the next. She is perpetually in search of fairy-tale narratives of transcendence and true love—grand ideas that Rose insists never materialise in the real world. When Cecilia announces she’s returning to New York for good after the collapse of her whirlwind marriage, Rose hopes her sister might finally face adulthood and all its compromises.

However, soon after her return, Cecilia becomes entangled with Avalon: a mysterious cabaret troupe that performs only at night aboard a boat traversing New York's waterways and then disappears as quickly as it came. The only way for Rose to find Cecilia is to track down Avalon herself.

As Rose delves into the mystery of her sister's disappearance, Avalon begins to weave its enchantment on her, too. With each step deeper into this beguiling underworld, Rose starts to question her beliefs about her own life and whether she might be ready to abandon the real world entirely.