The Dig: A Novel

by Anne Burt

Overview

When Sarajevo-born siblings Antonia and Paul join a wealthy Midwestern family in the 1990s, a series of events with deadly consequences is set in motion. Now, with her career on the line and her brother missing, Antonia must race against the clock to confront long-buried family secrets

Antonia King has a complicated relationship with the past. She and her brother were found amid the rubble of a bombed-out apartment in Sarajevo and taken in by a family of contractors in Thebes, Minnesota. Eager to escape the constraints of her adopted town, Antonia embarks on a high-powered legal career. But it isn’t long before her brother’s mysterious disappearance pulls her back home. There, over the course of a single day, Antonia unearths decades of secrets and lies, leading to shocking revelations about her adoptive family—and the sinister truth behind her biological mother’s death—that will alter the course of her life and change her definition of family forever.

Informed by timely issues of immigration, capitalism, and justice, yet timeless in its themes of love, identity, and competing loyalties, The Dig, inspired by the Greek tragedy Antigone, portrays a woman at odds with her history, forced to choose between her own ambitions and her loyalty to her beloved, idealistic brother.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781640096042
Publisher:	Catapult
Publication date:	03/07/2023
Pages:	272
Sales rank:	438,819
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

ANNE BURT is the editor of My Father Married Your Mother: Dispatches from the Blended Family and coeditor, with Christina Baker Kline, of About Face: Women Write About What They See When They Look in the Mirror. Her essays and fiction have appeared in numerous publications and venues, including Salon, NPR, and The Christian Science Monitor; she is a past winner of Meridian’s Editors’ Prize in Fiction. Anne lives in New York City.

Editorial Reviews

01/09/2023

Burt restages Antigone with a story of two Bosnian orphans and their adoptive American family in her inspired debut. Christopher and Eddie King, two American brothers who are in Sarajevo to build hotels when the siege begins in 1993, find Mujo and Andela in the rubble of a bombed-out building. The Kings adopt the children, rename them Paul and Antonia, and take them home to Thebes, Minn. Shortly after, Eddie dies from an opioid overdose. In the children’s teen years, Paul becomes estranged from Christopher after dropping out of high school and devoting his life to antiwar activism. Now, in the present, Paul goes missing after protesting a construction project in Thebes spearheaded by Christopher’s company, that would displace the local Somalian community, and is wanted by the police for his role in a riot. Christopher, feeling betrayed by Paul, urges Antonia, now a lawyer in the Twin Cities, to convince Paul to turn himself in. Occasionally, Burt’s allusions to Sophocles are more clunky than clever (the Bosnian siblings’ school in Thebes is named Mount Olympus), but the work’s strength lies in the ways Burt complicates her archetypal characters, such as in her portrayal of Antonia’s loyalty to Paul. It adds up to an engaging family tragedy. Agent: Susan Golomb, Writers House. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

02/03/2023

It's 1993. In a bombed-out building in Sarajevo, three-year-old Andela and six-year-old Mujo cower near their dead mother. American brothers find them and take them back to Minnesota. One adopts them but disappears. The other raises them, a tyrant who drives the boy, Paul now, to flee at 14. The girl, now Toni, leaves for Harvard after high school vowing never to return, but in 2014, she's back as a newly hired lawyer at the hottest firm in the Twin Cities. She's put her past behind her, the traumatic first years, humiliations in high school, and her uncle's domineering ways, but it comes back to bite her. Paul's back too, organizing Somali refugees against the uncle, who plans to tear down their settlement to build a shopping mall. A protest goes sour, and Paul's on the run. Toni confronts problems with her job, uncle, the missing Paul, and a boyfriend she wants to forget. The novel is slow in buildup, with many flashbacks, and the denouement is deflating. A few issues raised along the way are left unresolved. VERDICT Burt's (My Father Married Your Mother) humdrum mystery never builds up enough steam to keep readers involved.—David Keymer

Library Journal

2022-12-14
A young lawyer haunted by war trauma struggles to balance family loyalty against personal ambition.

It’s 2014. We meet the protagonist of Burt’s debut novel, Antonia King, as she chats with a wealthy Swedish airplane manufacturer in Minneapolis. He’s in town to start a factory, and Antonia—fresh out of Harvard Law School but reluctantly drawn back to Minnesota, where she has roots—is trying to help a fancy law firm land a major client. She does. But it leads to escalating clashes with her family and revelations about her past. Originally from Sarajevo, Antonia lost her parents to Milosevic’s genocide in the early 1990s, when she was 3. She and her brother, Paul, were adopted by two brothers from a small town in Minnesota, Christopher and Edward King. The orphaned siblings eventually end up living with Christopher, the rich owner of King Family Construction, and his family. Antonia promised to consider working for him after law school; he’s furious when she chooses the Swedish CEO instead. When her activist brother, Paul, who lives in their small hometown’s Somali community, goes missing after a violent protest at the site of their father's dream project—a glorified strip mall, the big dig of the title—Antonia agrees to help Christopher with damage control. She reunites with her tipsy adoptive mother, closeted gay brother, Instagram influencer sister, and an icky old flame with political clout—all while trying to quell a sex scandal for her new boss. Burt layers all of this on in a rapid-fire style and places Antonia in too many scenes with minor characters. The writing shines in the few moments of intimacy between people before Burt delivers a big reveal. But Antonia as a character fails to come to life even as she learns a real lesson about cutting the ties that bind.

An original yet ultimately flat family drama.

Kirkus Reviews

"[An] inspired debut . . . The work’s strength lies in the ways Burt complicates her archetypal characters . . . An engaging family tragedy." —Publishers Weekly

"The Dig is a riveting and chilling tale that mixes family drama and corporate intrigue (à la Succession) with thought-provoking insights about immigration, adoption, and the horrors of war. I couldn’t put it down." ––Angie Kim, Author of the Edgar Award winning Miracle Creek

"Mesmerizing, twisty, and beautifully written, The Dig combines the propulsive pacing of a thriller with the intimacy of a family drama." —Christina Baker Kline, New York Times #1 bestselling author of Orphan Train

“Equal parts family drama and suspenseful thriller, The Dig is a mesmerizing exploration of family, secrets, and betrayal. Beautifully written and resonant, Anne Burt draws a complex portrait of one young woman and what she discovers about herself—and her orphaned past in war-torn Sarajevo—while she searches for her missing brother. A brilliant debut from a brilliant writer.” —S. Kirk Walsh, bestselling author of The Elephant of Belfast

“The Dig is a smart, layered page turner whose propulsive plot takes on big contemporary issues about immigration and the fog of war. Toni King is a great character, a young women seeking a foothold in life and work but thrown off track by her own family. Anne Burt better write another novel soon!” —Alice Elliott Dark, author of Fellowship Point and In the Gloaming

From the Publisher