The Fates Will Find Their Way by Hannah Pittard is the story of the contemplation and unanswered questions left behind after a person goes missing. Nora Lindell disappeared on Halloween decades ago but the mystery of her disappearance still plagues the boys she grew up with—now men with their own families. Their destinies seem to all be affected by the departure of one girl—the girl who all the boys dreamed about but were never able to speak to. The boys grow up but Nora Lindell stays the same—a sixteen year old girl whose future is unclear, making the future the boys fanaticize all too possible.
This novel is definitely something every aspiring writer should keep on his or her shelf as a “how to.” The narration of the story is fabulous. It is told in a “we” prospective and the true narrator is never revealed. The reader learns about the names of the other boys, but never that of the narrator. In the back of your mind, you can picture what the narrator is like. He is not a single entity but that of a group. He is that group of boys you knew in high school or college who were always secretly perverted but protective, who were your friends that you could rely on.
The novel also has a great flow. I could sit and read for hours, not realizing that I was reading. It was like being with a group of friends having a conversation in the living room. I also wondered about the unknown fate of Nora Lindell and the theories that were distributed from each character were so well thought up that it was almost haunting how much this one girl affected so many lives.
The novel also brings up a theory most books about missing people usually don’t—what happens after someone disappears? Mystery novels usually have the missing person murdered by some psycho serial killer. Other genres will have the person come back in a joyful, tearful reunion. The typical novels never question what happens when someone disappears? The narrators try to explain what happened to Nora—they picture her raising children in the desert, in Mumbai during a bombing with a lesbian lover, dying in a snow storm two counties over.
If you want to be a writer or just like a really good story, I would go buy this novel right away.
