The Unmaking of June Farrow

Eamon and June discuss the dates of travel. He tells her that after she became pregnant with Annie, she became obsessed with breaking the curse.

Annie goes missing among the tobacco. Eamon and June panic, eventually finding her when she calls out for “Mama.”

Memories begin to surface more quickly, including June’s pregnancy and Annie’s birth. June and Eamon have sex. It’s like a “homecoming” rather than a first time.

When they wake, June asks Eamon if he killed Nathaniel. He tells her that she did, which she remembers as soon as he speaks.

The narrative returns to the 1950 Midsummer Faire, the night of Nathaniel’s murder. June remembers what happened that night: After the Faire, June and Annie met Nathaniel when they began to walk from the flower farm to Eamon’s farmhouse. June told Annie to run, and Nathaniel told June that she and Annie are both abominations of his sin and that he drowned Susanna. He held June under water, and she used a rock to hit him in the head, continuing to strike him until he died. June saw Annie watching and then lifted her up and ran home to Eamon, who cleaned her and Annie and burned their clothes. Eamon left the house.

Back in 1951, Eamon tells June that he had gone to find Nathaniel’s body and send it over the falls to make his death look like an accident. June realizes that her arrival in this time must have been planned. She was trying to fix the unraveling of time, and Margaret must have helped her. June confronts Margaret, who tells her that she’d promised to help June return from the future to Eamon and Annie. By traveling to a place she already existed, in 2022, June had found a loophole. This meant there would only be one timeline, for both herself and for Annie.

Margaret suggests that June still has a choice about whether or not to go through the door but that once she does, her memories from the other time will disappear. June thinks about how Birdie knew the secret as well and asks who Birdie is. Margaret looks at Annie, and June remembers calling Annie Bird. Police cars arrive at the house.

As Caleb attempts to arrest June for the murder of Nathaniel, the red door appears. Eamon tells her to go through it, but she makes her choice to stay in this time. She puts her hands out for Caleb to handcuff her.

In the car, Caleb tells June he’d found proof of her guilt in a photograph from the Faire, in which June was wearing what Mimi described from the night of the murder. He asks, “[W]hy do you look like [Susanna]?” (304). June tells him he already knows why, meaning the fact that June and Caleb are siblings. Caleb stops the car, and they get out. June tells him that Susanna lied about her death to protect her from Nathaniel but doesn’t mention the door. She tells him that Nathaniel confessed to killing their mother and tried to drown her and that she killed him. Caleb throws his handcuff keys to the ground and drives away.

June remembers seeing the door in 1950: She left Annie asleep knowing Eamon would be home any minute and took her opportunity to end the curse by going to 2022, a time when she already existed.

In 1952, Susanna’s body is exhumed as Caleb looks on. June’s memories of her other life fade, and the door appears less frequently. The novel concludes with June’s wedding to Eamon, who has asked her to marry him again.