Tomato Girl: A Novel

Jayne Pupek

May 2025 · Algonquin Books

About this ebook

For eleven-year-old Ellie Sanders, her father has always been the rock that she could cling to when her mother's emotional troubles became too frightening. But when he comes under the thrall of the pretty teenager who raises vegetables and tomatoes for sale at the general store that he runs, Ellie sees her security slowly slipping away. Now she must be witness and warden to her mother's gradual slide into madness.
Told from Ellie's point of view, Tomato Girl takes the reader into the soul of a terrified young girl clinging desperately to childhood while being forced into adulthood years before she is ready. To save herself, she creates a secret world, a place in which her mother gets well, her father returns to being the man he was, and the Tomato Girl is banished forever. Tomato Girl marks the debut of a gifted and promising new author who has written a timeless Southern novel.

About the author

Jayne Pupek, who lives near Richmond, is a Virginia native and a former social worker. Though Tomato Girl is her first novel, her writing has appeared in many literary journals. She is the author of a book of poetry titled Forms of Intercession.