The Story of a Dog? Where Is the Fox?
Joyce Carol Oates, Fox: A Novel (New York: Hogarth: Random House, June 17, 2025). Hardcover: $32. 672pp, 6X9”. ISBN: 978-0-593978-08-5.
**
“Who is Francis Fox? A charming English teacher new to the idyllic Langhorne Academy, Fox beguiles many of his students, their parents, and his colleagues at the elite boarding school, while leaving others wondering where he came from and why his biography is so enigmatic. When two brothers discover Fox’s car half-submerged in a pond in a local nature preserve and parts of an unidentified body strewn about the nearby woods, the entire community, including Detective Horace Zwender and his deputy, begins to ask disturbing questions about Francis Fox and who he might really be. A… galloping tale of crime and complicity, revenge and restitution, victim vs. predator, Joyce Carol Oates’s Fox illuminates the darkest corners of the human psyche while asking profound moral questions about justice and the response evil demands. A character as magnetically diabolical as Patricia Highsmith’s Tom Ripley and Vladimir Nabokov’s Humbert Humbert, Francis Fox enchants and manipulates nearly everyone around him, until at last he meets someone he can’t outfox. Written” with “interweaving multiple points of view…”
I chose this book for review because Joyce Carol Oates’ name sounded familiar. It reminded me of a canonical literary author, but I think I was thinking of somebody else. Oates’ novels have been finalists for the Pulitzer, but she has not won it. But she has won other awards, especially for Them (novel about connections between three American-dreaming characters seeking marriage and money). She spent most of her life teaching at Princeton before recently transferring to Rutgers. Apparently, she succeeded in academia because of the success of her novels without finishing her PhD at Rice that she started some time after 1961. Though she published her first book, short-story collection By the North Gate in 1963, or two years after finishing her MA. So, she was not yet a “full-time writer” when she quit her PhD program. A few stories in this collection had previously appeared between 1959-62. But the collection did not do especially well. And Oates did not sell her first novel until 1964. I do not know why I recall her name, but I think I heard it a few times during my literary studies. So, it is important to review what Oates has been up to recently.
The cover is very well designed. I especially like the simplified and yet three-dimensional-suggesting artistry in the trees. I have seen similar simple-fuzzy tree designs on other covers recently. I tried imitating this style, and it turned out to be more difficult than I imagined to make them realistic yet simple in this manner. The cover also employes the torn-cover design: it looks like a cover was printed, torn and then overlayed over a front page with a simplifying drawing technique. The specks of red ink are a delicate touch. It is just an attractive design overall.
The contents list promises this will be a literary novel by the originality of the chapter titles: “Mystery-Journal”, “Good-Luck Piece”, or “Wet-Whiskered Kiss”. This high standard is also set by quotes from classics in the frontmatter.
This expectation is contradicted by the “Prologue” that is written in a juvenile style, starting with: “There was never a time when I was not in love with Mr. Fox.” This seems to be intended to interest readers by starting to explain what the title is about, and by appealing to their emotions. But the rest of the prologue babbles about this love, with only a mention of their “secret” as a new point raised.
The first chapter, “The Trophy: Wieland Pond: 29 October 2013” begins with a dull attempt to raise suspense: “It will be no ordinary morning.” The term “ordinary” deflates the promise, as it merely promises the events will be slightly better than totally dull. General or stock descriptions of “rain” and the “sky” follow. Then, a truck drives into grotesque water. Then, a bit of excitement: a barking dog is displayed as it jumps out of the truck. There is a dull conversation with this dog, where the owner attempts to convince the dog not to “run wild”. Since the leash is “released”, I assume the owner should be a bit more confident the dog is not going to run away, or do something “wild”. Then, a description of the daily urine and poop (mention of the rhyming “loop”) walks between this human and dog. A bunch of birds appear. This description could not be any more boring… Or could it? The next section finally introduces something happening outside what is extremely mundane: there is a “splash” in the water. Readers are asked to guess what might be splashing. Then, the dog wanders off following a smell. While these relatively short paragraphs are at least easy to read, then a page-long paragraph follows from the dog’s perspective: “a carrion-cloak in which to wrap herself, myriad drunken smells swarming into her brain, overcharged as an electric socket…” Why would the dog be overcharged by many smells? A dog can process the different smells without being overwhelmed: this is why dogs are used to find stuff. If dogs got overwhelmed from different smells, they would just stand there in deep confusion. And then there’s pondering about “her doggy soul”, where she is certain, “She is not a rebel.” There’s loyalty expressed to her human as a “savior” after she was tossed by a highway. From the dog’s perspective, it would not remember what happened when it was a baby. And it probably does not care it has been “saved”.
What is happening? Why is this happening? Why is this author using personification to assign biologically unnatural ideas to this dog? Why is the psychology focusing on a dog, instead of exploring the murder promised at the center of this plot? The author seems to have been carried away by an unrelated plotline in a digressive series of random thoughts. This probably means this novel is unreadable unless it is assigned-reading in a class or the like. There are moments that are kind of interesting, but then platitudes, generalizations, or repeating phrases fill most of the story with hot-air. I do not recommend attempting to read this book. It’s just generally pretty bad. Maybe if the intro was from the perspective of a fox, it would have made sense.
Pennsylvania Literary Journal: Spring 2025 issue: https://anaphoraliterary.com/journals/plj/plj-excerpts/book-reviews-spring-2025

Painfully long and repetitive and for what??? I’d recommend watching literally any episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit instead.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC! This novel releases in June.

Described by Joyce Carol Oates as her first whodunnit novel, <i>Fox</i> is a literary mystery with the brutalized corpse of a popular middle school English teacher—discovered by locals near his wrecked car in a ravine, deep in the Jersey woods—at its narrative center. Francis Fox. Who would want to kill him? Was he killed, or was it suicide? A drunken accident?

Over 700 pages JCO plunges the reader into the twisted psychology of Fox, as well as the young students he manipulates, the girl students he preys on—his “kittens” to his “Mr. Tongue”—all of this Oates paints in detail, unafraid of rubbing the reader’s face in it. Broken families, sexual trauma, brutalities and paranoia and suicidal fantasy: explored by way of a big cast of characters: creations with complexities in which lesser writers would get lost. And how did she pull off such a twist in the last 2% of the novel? And to see such a twist pulled off brilliantly, as this one is. Sublime. The whodunnit, an art form hard to successfully pull off, but Oates makes it look easy!

Who am I but a massive Joyce Carol Oates fanboy. It’s rare she misses the mark with me, though it has happened. <i>Fox</i> is this writer doing what she does best, as only she can. Long live JCO.

Fox is a dark, disturbing view of a teacher-predator and his actions once he relocates into a rural town. Please read other reviews as this esteemed author has created many beautiful novels. For me, this one was very unsettling.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for the opportunity to read this ARC.

Let us be clear Joyce Carol Oates is an amazing author and I love her work, That being understood, I had trouble with this book. It is dark and disturbing and many times the details were just too much for me. Details that were repeated over and over again. I felt guilty reading it, like I was doing something wrong just by reading about abuse. I struggled to discover what Oates wanted me to learn from this book. The easiest lesson was the importance of fathers in their children's lives. Fox speaks often about what easy prey girls without fathers are, but then I realized that their mothers weren't protecting them either. So maybe that wasn't the lesson. Next was it the income divide, the over sexualization of children and adolescents today, lack of religion, working mothers, etc. She covers the gambit of possible reasons why abuse occurs, but to no comforting conclusion.

This book will stay with me for a long time and maybe that is the intent of Oates, to open a dialogue surrounding these issues with the hopes of shining a light on an ever increasing problem.

"Who is Francis Fox? A charming English teacher new to the idyllic Langhorne Academy, Fox beguiles many of his students, their parents, and his colleagues at the elite boarding school, while leaving others wondering where he came from and why his biography is so enigmatic. When two brothers discover Fox's car half-submerged in a pond in a local nature preserve and parts of an unidentified body strewn about the nearby woods, the entire community, including Detective Horace Zwender and his deputy, begins to ask disturbing questions about Francis Fox and who he might really be.

A hypnotic, galloping tale of crime and complicity, revenge and restitution, victim vs. predator, Joyce Carol Oates's Fox illuminates the darkest corners of the human psyche while asking profound moral questions about justice and the response evil demands. A character as magnetically diabolical as Patricia Highsmith's Tom Ripley and Vladimir Nabokov's Humbert Humbert, Francis Fox enchants and manipulates nearly everyone around him, until at last he meets someone he can't outfox. Written in Oates's trademark intimate, sweeping style, and interweaving multiple points of view, Fox is a triumph of craftsmanship and artistry, a novel as profound as it is propulsive, as moving as it is full of mystery."

Fits right into my broader definition of dark academia.

*Fox* by Joyce Carol Oates is a haunting, complex novel that delves deep into themes of power, obsession, and the fragility of identity. Oates masterfully captures the tension between her characters, drawing you into a psychological web that’s as compelling as it is unsettling. The writing is sharp, vivid, and full of emotional depth, making every page feel intense and charged with meaning. This is a thought-provoking, chilling read for fans of dark, psychological fiction that explores the darker corners of human nature.

Joyce Carol Oates latest novel is a searing depiction of a pedophile and the irreparable damage he can cause among many lives in a small town. Francis Fox, name newly changed, is a hugely popular English teacher at an elite New Jersey private school. The adolescent students--particularly the girls--adore him and long lines form outside of his office. When Mr. Fox turns up at the bottom of a lake a series of revelations emerge, and anyone who has read Oates before will know that she does not shy away from details. A good mystery lies at the heart of this compelling novel.

My first time reading Joyce Carol Oates; while the subject matter is dark and not enjoyable, the novel itself was interesting and well-written. It was a bit slow for my taste, but was suspenseful enough to keep me going.

Dark subject matter. Beautifully written. Multiple points of view and dual time lines.

#NetGalley

As a quirky 30-year-old who reads with one eyebrow permanently raised, I was both unnerved and captivated. It’s eerie and elegant, leaving you feeling weird, like you forgot something important on purpose.

Every time I thought I'd figured out where this book as going, it pivoted. At the risk of sharing any spoilers, I will be brief and unspecific in my review. This was my first ever Joyce Carol Oates novel and like others have noted, I was not prepared for, at times, the meandering storytelling though I really enjoyed the style for the most part. It took me a while to get into the book but once I did I needed to know how everything played out. I found some sections so deeply disturbing that I wanted to crawl out of my skin. Was this a modern retelling of Lolita? A murder mystery? A police procedural? Some other liminal fourth thing? Whatever it was, I was compelled to keep reading and will be looking forward to more Joyce Carol Oates novels in my future.

Thank you to Random House Publishing, Random House | Hogarth, and NetGalley for an advance ebook in exchange for an honest review.

Wow! This book was fantastic. What a story. Everything about this hit the right spot for me. The characters were incredible. Mr. Fox was written so realistically that I had a hard time reading his passages; he came across as too real. My god. The rest of the characters were written with equal intensity. The ending was not really a surprise, more of a confirmation of what I had figured out along the way. The plot itself was excellent, the story a fast-moving page-turner. All in all, a phenomenal book. I look forward to more by this author.

Fox is a literary thriller, with a modern-day Lolita storyline shot straight through it.
It’s dark like season one of True Detective is dark—slow, heavy, and not afraid to go there.

The story opens with a car overturned in a lake and a body, almost completely ravaged, discovered beside it. When the body is identified as a beloved teacher, Francis Fox, who taught at an elite boarding school, nobody can understand why this would happen.
An investigation lays the truth bare, revealing the dark underbelly of the town and the people who live there.

This book slowly, unflinchingly, grabs ahold of the reader, forcing them to peer out from behind a true monster’s eyes, unable to look away until every stone is left unturned.

I can’t tell you the last time I read something this horrifying. And I’m equally unsure of when it’ll leave my mind.

In her latest work of literary psychological suspense, Joyce Carol Oates proves once again why she's considered one of America's greatest living writers. Fox: A Novel is a masterfully crafted exploration of power, manipulation, and the dark undercurrents that can lurk beneath seemingly respectable facades.

The novel centers on Francis Fox, a charismatic middle school teacher whose sudden disappearance from an elite boarding school sets the narrative in motion. Oates, with her characteristic psychological acuity, weaves a deeply disturbing tale that examines the ripple effects of predatory behavior and the complex web of complicity that can enable it.

What distinguishes this work is Oates's brilliant structural choices. The story unfolds through multiple perspectives, each voice adding layers to our understanding of Fox and the circumstances surrounding his disappearance. This kaleidoscopic approach allows Oates to explore not just the central mystery, but the wider implications of power dynamics in educational institutions and society at large.

The prose is vintage Oates—hypnotic and precise, with an underlying current of tension that builds steadily throughout the narrative. Her writing style here is particularly effective in its restraint; she knows exactly when to pull back and when to delve deeper, creating a rhythm that mirrors the psychological states of her characters. The author's trademark ability to illuminate the darkest corners of human nature is on full display, though readers should be forewarned that the subject matter is frequently challenging and disturbing.

Thematically, the novel grapples with questions of innocence and culpability, the nature of evil, and the ways in which institutions can either enable or prevent abuse. Oates examines how charm and authority can be weaponized, and how communities process and respond to revelations of betrayal. The boarding school setting serves as both literal location and metaphor, a closed ecosystem where power imbalances can flourish unchecked.

While the novel's pacing occasionally becomes repetitive—sometimes deliberately so for effect—this minor flaw is overshadowed by the overall power of the narrative. The character development is exceptional, with even minor figures rendered in complex, nuanced strokes. Oates's psychological insight into her characters' motivations and self-deceptions is particularly noteworthy.

The novel's greatest strength lies in how it captures the nuances of choice and consequence. As noted by several critics, Oates explores how people's decisions—both active choices and passive acceptance—can contribute to systemic failures of protection and oversight. The mystery element of the plot serves as a framework for these deeper explorations rather than mere entertainment.

Though not an easy read due to its subject matter, Fox represents Oates at her most incisive. It's a novel that demands attention and engagement, refusing to offer simple answers to complex questions. Instead, it invites readers to examine uncomfortable truths about power, responsibility, and the institutions we trust with our children's safety.

For readers familiar with Oates's work, Fox will feel both familiar and fresh—a continuation of her career-long exploration of violence and vulnerability in American life, but with new urgency and relevance. For newcomers to her work, it serves as a powerful introduction to her commanding literary skills, though they might want to start with some of her less challenging works.

This is a novel that will linger in readers' minds long after they've finished it, prompting discussions and self-reflection. While it may not be her most enjoyable work, it's certainly among her most important, adding another significant chapter to Oates's already remarkable literary legacy.

Mr. Fox leaves one school after an incident with one of his female students. He is hired at a prestigious school with a new name vowing to stay clear of abusing some of the girls until he sees some to include in his Kitten category. When Mr. Fox is found dead in his car in a polluted river, the detective finds his child pornography site with thousands of subscribers on the dark web. The investigation begins as parents, staff, and students are questioned. The hold Mr. Fox had on students and staff is frightening. I feel that this story lacks credibility and was disappointed becuause I really like Joyce Carol Oates' writing.

This psychological thriller dives deep into the unsettling story of a manipulative, charming figure who infiltrates a prestigious private school, wreaking havoc on everyone in his path. His mysterious disappearance and grim discovery set off a chain reaction that unravels the lives of students, faculty, and the town.

The writing is sharp and thought-provoking, weaving through multiple perspectives and timelines, keeping you engaged despite the heaviness of the subject matter. The plot is dark, yet Oates’s prose makes it all the more compelling, forcing you to confront the ripple effects of one person’s twisted actions. It’s intense, layered, and unrelentingly thought-provoking.

Oates masterfully pulls you into a world of moral ambiguity, where every character is left questioning their role in the tragedy. This is a gripping, unsettling read that stays with you long after the last page. Highly recommend for fans of literary thrillers with a deep psychological edge.

I read a lot of literary but the language is so complex here that you don’t hear a voice. My tongue was tripping on strings of strange adjectives. Could not read it.

Wow, Fox is a novel that is brilliantly written in Joyce Carol Oates' signature style. It is one that will stick with me long after I've moved on to read other books, and I haven't decided how I feel about that yet. Fox is shocking, unsettling, thought provoking, and just brilliant. It is easily one of her best novels to date.

I’ve read ever so many novels and stories of Joyce Carol Oates and however horrific these stories m may be—frequently that’s a good word for them—the prose is always, always elegant and arresting. Not so here. This is the first Oates novel I’ve ever read where I wished she had taken her time. There are many trite turns of phrase. When it isn’t trite, it’s flat.