Iowa-based writer Jan Netolicky will visit Eagle Harbor Book Company to talk about her novel “We Dare Not Whisper,” which illuminates the suffering of individuals with bipolar disorder and the unthinkable challenges facing those closest to them at 3 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 18.

Luce Garrison narrates the tale, the unraveling of her family: a mother plagued by bipolar disorder, a father guilt-ridden by his inability to confront his wife’s descent into madness and Luce’s own unassailable conviction that she can never be as loved as the brothers she has lost.

As a child, Luce often lingered over albums of glossy photographs, longing to be just like her lovely, enigmatic mother. But images frozen for an instant could not capture the lightless depression and manic bouts of frenzied activity that demonized Bets Garrison.

Luce does not know the depths of her mother’s undiagnosed mental illness. The only thing she knows for sure is that she is an inadequate substitute for the older brother who was stillborn just three months after her parents’ marriage.

After giving birth to Jonny, 11 years Luce’s junior, Bets develops an obsessive, disturbing devotion which trumps every other relationship in the Garrison home. Although Luce tries to minimize the gulf, she is excluded from the smothering attention her mother lavishes upon her brother.

Caught in a void, she can neither be loving sister nor cherished daughter. She can only be in the way.

Set in rural Wisconsin, “We Dare Not Whisper” explores the toxic legacy of a self-destructive family.

Visit www.eagleharborbookcompany.com to learn more about this and other upcoming author events.