While I was not mentally prepared for the graphic and disturbing CSA in this novel, it will undoubtedly be one of my top books this year.

Oftentimes stories of this length can seem overkill - too drawn out, too wordy, too self-indulgent. However, that is not the case with Fox. Joyce Carol Oates is a master of her craft, and the intentionality with which she weaves together this story left me feeling like I needed every single word she provided. This is not a plot-driven novel, but a deeply rich character study into the minds of the most depraved predators in our society, as well as the many different types of victims that exist - whether directly or indirectly related to the perpetrators.

Fox is nothing short of a masterful literary mystery, and my only complaint is that I have no one to discuss it with until it is released on June 17th. This book will be highly recommended by me to my fellow readers.

TRIGGER WARNING: CSA. I wish this book had come with a trigger warning because I'm not sure I would have read it, had I know the extent and depravity and disgusting details of years of Child Sexual Assault that were depicted. It was well written and intriguing but I couldn't get over the ick and just horrible feeling of the CSA. If you can get over that part, it is an excellent book.

Fox comes out next week on June 17, 2025 and you can purchase HERE.

Nostalgia: yearning for something that never was recalled with much maudlin emotion as if it had ever been.

Francis Fox feels not the merest wisp of nostalgia for the childhood of "Frank Farrell," which he can barely remember and which he may have conflated with films and TV of the era of an equal banality and tedium. Long estranged from his thoroughly undistinguished parents, siblings. Descended from thoroughly undistinguished ancestors. Not even a modest fortune in the Farrell family, no estate to inherit even if (a sizable if) he'd have been a probable heir.

Generally, I find JCO hit or miss. For every novel I enjoy, there is one I put down. Add this to the enjoy pile! Outstanding, creepy, provocative, engrossing, disturbing and, above all, brilliantly written. This will not be for everyone as the subject matter is polarizing, but I was riveted.

Fox by Joyce Carol Oates

I’ve never read a book by this author so I don’t know how it compares to other works. While a little too wordy for me, I did appreciate the beauty in the command of language. I did find it repetitive and slow for the majority of the time. This might have been the case of it being the wrong time to read it. I imagine this one as more of a winter read for some reason - when the world is slow and I can sink into a dark tale.

Told from multiple perspectives, the story did feel very explored from all angles. It was nuanced, provocative and graphic, bringing a modern spin to Lolita, so do your research for trigger warnings before picking it up.

Readers who enjoy true literary fiction, detailed and flowery prose, and books that push boundaries will find much to enjoy here.

I wanted to love this, Joyce Carol Oates has always been brilliant, but admittedly, not all her books are for me, and Fox fell into that category. The fragmented prose made for choppy reading, and the subject matter was too far over my personal line. Grooming of a minor by a teacher, SA, just icky, disturbing stuff. Not sure why that’s the one thing I can’t handle but it is.

I recognize the talent and effort put into this, and JCO has earned her long and successful career, but Fox made me feel like I was at the waning end of her journey.

Joyce Carol Oates’s Fox is not simply a novel—it’s a slow burn psychological excavation. From the opening revelation of Mr. Fox’s death, the narrative unfurls with deliberate unease, inviting the reader not into a mystery to be solved, but into a portrait to be disassembled. The question is never just who killed Mr. Fox, but who was he—and why was he allowed to be that way for so long?

Oates employs her signature gothic realism to unsettling effect. Her prose is cold and precise, almost forensic, as she peels back the social veneers that shield male privilege and silence female suffering. The novel’s length is no accident—it mirrors the exhausting, relentless nature of trauma itself. Just as survivors are forced to revisit the same stories, the text loops and lingers, making the reader sit with its discomfort rather than offering easy resolution.

Themes of predation are central. Girls are not merely characters in Fox—they are symbols, echoes, victims, witnesses. Oates refuses to sensationalize their pain; instead, she illuminates the subtle mechanics of grooming, complicity, and denial with chilling accuracy. Mr. Fox is not a monster in the woods—he’s far more dangerous: the monster in the house, at the school, among the respected.

While the novel does risk alienating some readers with its repetitious and meandering structure, that very structure becomes part of the experience. The narrative’s slowness mirrors the cultural resistance to hearing, believing, and confronting the stories of girls. It may test your patience, but that tension is the point.

Ultimately, Fox is a disturbing, immersive meditation on complicity and silence. It’s not a comfortable read—but it’s an essential one, delivered with Oates’s trademark literary precision and psychological depth. It lingers, like all truths too long ignored.

I've read and enjoyed many novels by Oates, but this one was too dark for me. Maybe it's the times, the memories it evoked, the way so much of contemporary media is focusing on defining predators, sexual traffickers, and grooming, that I felt more weary with each page than curious.

No one writes a behemoth of a book with characters that stay with you quite like Joyce Carol Oates. Taking on a new style of story, Fox is about a charismatic teacher at an elite prep school. When his body is discovered, the truth about who he was is slowly revealed. Despite the very dark content of the book, it was compulsively readable and I found that I couldn't stop reading it once I had started. An impressive reinvention from a writer we have all known and loved for a very long time, Fox is perfect for readers of My Dark Vanessa and I Have Some Questions For You.

Thank you Netgalley & Hogarth for an eARC ♥️♥️♥️♥️

I picked up *Fox* thinking it would be another dark academia novel to casually enjoy with my morning coffee. Big mistake. Three hours later, I was still on my couch, coffee cold, completely consumed by this psychological labyrinth.
Francis Fox is the kind of character who walks into a room and suddenly the air feels heavier. He's that teacher students whisper about in the halls - the one who makes literature feel dangerous and exciting. Oates crafts him with such precision that you'll catch yourself almost liking him, right before she reminds you exactly why that's terrifying.
The discovery of the car in the pond is just the beginning of this unsettling journey. What follows is a masterclass in suspense that had me:
📌 Checking my locks at 11pm
📌Side-eyeing my own English degree
📌Texting friends "BUT WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?" in all caps
What makes this book special isn't just the mystery (though that's compelling enough), but how Oates uses it to explore power dynamics, privilege, and the stories we tell ourselves to sleep at night. The boarding school setting becomes a pressure cooker for all these tensions, and watching them explode is equally horrifying and mesmerizing.
Perfect for readers who want:
✓ A character study that doubles as a psychological thriller
✓ Prose that cuts like a scalpel
✓ That "I need to discuss this with someone immediately" feeling
Fair warning: You'll finish the last page and immediately want to flip back to the beginning to see what you missed. And you probably missed a lot - Oates plays fair but she plays smart. 🤌🏽

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️I received an Advanced Readers Copy from NetGalley and when I downloaded and saw it was 650+ pages about a pedophile I said I wasn’t going to read it. But I reconsidered and decided to honor my commitment and give it a try. So glad that I did. This is a captivating read. Oates takes on a very touchy (no pun intended) subject and approaches it brilliantly from several perspectives. This is also a thriller, dead body found in the first chapter, that holds the reader’s interest throughout. The characters are very well developed. Along the way we meet victims, perpetrators, family supporters, deniers, and enablers. This is a sensitive topic but Oates treats it with respect. It is a real page turner and reads very quickly. It resolved with a very satisfying conclusion., as well. I have not read much of JCO but I expect this novel will have me going back to read more of her works.

Few authors plunge into the darker recesses of human nature with as much skill and intensity as Joyce Carol Oates, in her forthcoming novel, Fox, scheduled for release on June 17. Billed as her first murder mystery, Fox is about Francis Fox, a charismatic middle school English teacher at a private, elite school in Wieland, New Jersey, who ends up dead in an apparent single-car wreck.

Readers should be prepared to be shocked by the dirty deeds of Fox who lures young girls into his den, er, his office in the basement of the school. His shocking manipulations of the select seventh and eighth graders in his four classes are not for the faint. Little is spared in the descriptions of what he does to the girls who he first drugs.

Detective Howard Zenger is charged with solving the circumstances surrounding the death of Fox. Methodically he pieces together the clues that lead up to what happened not only to Fox but to his students. The girls seem not to fear Fox but rather seek his adoration. None tell their parents they are being abused because Fox has brainwashed them into thinking he loves them.

Oates seems to be creating her own Lolita (Vladimir Nabokov) story rather than a murder mystery. Overall, in a blurb comparing Fox to Tom Ripley, a fascinating character who lives long in the mind of readers, Fox is found to be lacking. This is a story you must choose to push through or you throw up your hands and mark it DNF.

Joyce Carol Oates published her first book in 1963 and has since published 60 novels, a number of plays and novellas, and many volumes of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction. She also writes under the pseudonyms Rosamond Smith and Lauren Kelly. She lives in New Jersey.

My review will be posted on Goodreads and Instagram starting June 11, 2025.

I would like to thank Hogarth, an imprint of Random House, and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in return for an objective review.

3.5 rounded up! Thank you so much to NetGalley and Random House for the arc.

This book was deeply disturbing and dark. Please proceed with extreme caution!

This was both gripping and made me want to look away. Oates’ style is new to me. It was honestly tough to get through because I struggle with thrillers (I’m scared!) but she certainly succeeded in scaring tf out of me!

I think the strongest parts of the book were the plot, switching narratives, and setting. The parts I would change are some of the graphic scenes. I just…don’t need to know (if you know you know). I didn’t rate this higher because I found it so hard to stomach and it didn’t add to the story in my opinion.

The ending was good!!!

If you like dark thrillers this is for you. If you don’t, stay away.

This was one of the most difficult books I’ve ever read. I went into it having forgotten the premise and was in for a shock. Highly recommend reading trigger warnings as this book holds nothing back.

That being said, I flew through this book despite the 640 page count. I’ve never read Joyce Carol Oates before but now I understand the hype and praise for her. The writing was enchanting, difficult to put down even when discussing horrible topics. I hated the main character and felt the revolution Oates intended. I believe this book achieved exactly what it set out to do.

It is hard to recommend this book given the graphic content, but if you are able to stomach it I think this is an absolutely worthwhile read.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for access to this eARC. All opinions are my own.

Wow. This is one of the darkest, most triggering book I've ever read. Relentless, disturbing, and eerie. JCO needs no introduction and you can tell this story needed to come out bursting out of her. This book isn't for the faint of heart. Check the triggering warnings.

As a longtime admirer of Joyce Carol Oates, I opened Fox with high expectations. Her command of language is, as always, undeniable—but here, eloquence couldn’t disguise what ultimately felt like an overlong, unnecessary retread. The narrative meanders, circling familiar terrain—most notably Lolita—without offering much in the way of fresh perspective. Even in the hands of a writer as gifted as Oates, I’m not convinced we needed yet another iteration of that particular story.

The characters, with the notable exception of Demetrius, were uniformly tedious—either emotionally flat or so stylized as to feel almost parodic. And while the setting of Weiland and the exclusive Langhorne Academy could have been immersive, the prose was so dense and self-conscious that it pushed me out rather than drawing me in. The novel seemed more interested in its own cleverness than in building a world or deepening its characters.

One moment that perfectly encapsulated my frustration: “‘Inappro-pitly’—what’s that?” This from a seventh-grade girl, attending a prestigious private school, described as relatively intelligent? It defies credibility and disrupted whatever suspension of disbelief I had left.

Despite Oates’s literary prowess, Fox felt like a chore to finish. I considered abandoning it more than once—not out of outrage, but sheer boredom. I remain a fan of her work, but this novel simply didn’t earn its length or its premise.

Quintessential Carol Joyce Oates. One of the first books I read when I was transitioning from YA to adult was We Were The Mulvaneys. It helped to cement my love for contemporary literature. At the time it very heavy but it stayed with me.

Fast forward nearly 30 years, this one did the same. I was thrilled to get to read this one early. I had to read it in parts and doses. It's heavy, it's complicated but it's also written so beautifully you need to keep going while trying to find time to digest it..

This is what I call the book lover's book. This is not a beach read or something for the causal dabbler, this is a book for the voracious reader. In the right hands it will be greatly appreciated.

Joyce Carol Oates’s writing is, as always, incredible. She knows exactly how to get under your skin with just a few words. Fox is no exception in that regard. The prose pulled me in right away and kept me engaged throughout.

That said, I found the subject matter pretty difficult to sit with. The story is unsettling, emotionally intense, and at times disturbing. I can appreciate what Oates was doing. She is clearly not afraid to confront uncomfortable truths, but it made the experience more emotionally draining than I expected.

Definitely a powerful read, but not an easy one. Recommended if you’re in the right headspace and want something that lingers long after you put it down.

* I received an advanced reader’s copy of this book from NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group in exchange for my honest review.

This is an uncomfortable book. Any book dealing with grooming should be. As expected, Joyce Carol Oates is able to masterfully tell this story, showing the true harm that grooming has on a person, a school, and a community.

This is an epic book and does take time to get through, but as with all JCO's books, it's worth it.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House-Hogarth for the ARC!

I have not had the pleasure of reading works by Joyce Carol Oates before, but I will definitely do in the future. The writing style is unique, and both enticing and off-putting, just like Mr Fox, the subject of this book.

It is revealed upfront that the remains, seeming to be that of Mr Fox, a private school English teacher, have been found. The whodunnit aspect does not appear to be the point - the mystery, while technically not fully revealed until epilogue, is clear to the reader really early (although not to the detectives). This is a character study first and foremost. We learn a lot about Mr Fox, as at least half of the book is from his POV, and the rest of the book is about other people thinking about him. We meet a lot of other characters as well, some with a POV, and some seen through other character's eyes. Given how unreliable of a narrator Mr Fox is, I've been taking his opinions on people and events with a large grain of salt.

Even though I enjoyed the book, the repetition of same thoughts occurring to the same character was somewhat grating and the pacing was uneven (this could have been 150-200 pages shorter, easily).

I found it hard to disentangle whether these were author's opinions, or how, she was indicating, the world sees certain characters, but she made a point of saying one character was overweight every time she mentioned him (it was not necessary after first one or two), and another character was ugly ("ferret-faced", this very specific description was used by multiple different characters, which leads me to question whether it was written on the girls forehead, or perhaps, an editor could have made some changes here).

5⭐️ This psychological thriller had me on the edge of my seat! Creepy charismatic Francis Fox is the new English teacher at an exclusive private school. All the young girls love him!

The first half is from the POV of Mr Fox. The second half picks up from the POV of police Sgt H Zwender investigating a mysterious murder/accident. Interspersed chapters from the POV of several young female students and female friends of Mr Fox.

So much to love about this book, the gorgeous writing, the interesting characters, the plot and mystery. Big twist at the end I did not see coming! Highly recommend!

Warning: pedophilia, mental illness, murder, suicide

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishers for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.