The Alternatives

Caoilinn Hughes's "The Alternatives" introduces the Flattery sisters, four brilliant, academically distinguished Irish women in their thirties, orphaned by tragedy and now leading disparate lives across the globe. Their world is upended when the eldest, a geologist acutely aware of the planet's precarious future, mysteriously vanishes from her work and home. This forces the remaining sisters—an academic, a caterer, and a tech entrepreneur—to converge on a dilapidated bungalow in the Irish countryside. As they embark on a search for their reclusive sibling, they are compelled to confront long-buried wounds from their shared past, the profound impact of their parents' deaths, and the anxieties of an uncertain collective future. Both fiercely witty and unexpectedly poignant, the novel offers an intimate portrait of sisterhood, resilience, and humanity's place on a changing Earth, all while exploring themes of environmental dread and the meaning of meaningful work in a world teetering on the brink.