A TORONTO STAR BESTSELLER From the Giller-nominated author of Y , a taut, suspenseful novel about the dark corners of a small town, and the secrets that lurk within... By a frozen lake, ten-year-old Jesse waits for his father. It's New Year's Day, and his dad promised a fresh start. But Jesse messed it all up. And that's when he meets the woman. In the months ahead, the woman's sudden disappearance sets off a chain of events in Whale Bay, spanning out like fracture lines into the lives of her husband, the detective trying to solve her case, and of Jesse and his family—a young boy cracking like ice under the weight of a terrible secret. How A Woman Becomes a Lake is a chilling literary mystery that asks what happens when we are failed by the ones we love.