The Catherine Wheel

In Jean Stafford’s final novel, The Catherine Wheel, readers are drawn into the complex inner world of Katharine Congreve, a Boston socialite caring for her cousin's children in Hawthorne, Maine, during the late 1930s. As she navigates the pressures of her unfulfilled desires, particularly regarding a potential romantic entanglement, Katharine confronts her envy, memories, and guilt amid the seemingly idyllic summer. With the backdrop of familial tension and hidden anguish, the narrative slowly reveals the unraveling of her psyche under scrutiny.