Ducks, Newburyport Summary
Lucy Ellmann

Ducks, Newburyport Overview

Told through the stream-of-consciousness perspective of its unnamed protagonist, Lucy Ellmann’s Ducks, Newburyport is a narrative commentary on contemporary American society. The text is interspersed with the first-person narrative perspective of a mountain lioness in pursuit of her stolen kittens across Ohio state. Like her protagonist, Ellmann was born in America but raised partly in the United Kingdom. She tackles themes of violence, motherhood, and debt in this Booker-Prize-nominated novel.