The Bluff: A Novel

Succession meets The Family Stone in bestselling author Wade Rouse’s humorous and sharply observant look at a family teetering on the edge of merry mayhem. 

The Chapmans do Christmas the way they do everything: impeccably, expensively, and with the unshakable belief that good lighting can conceal bad blood. Their annual Christmas card may look picture-perfect, but behind the polite smiles there’s a storm brewing. This year, at their grand lakefront cottage on Mackinac Island, a snowstorm traps generations of Chapmans—and their schemes—under one roof.
 
Chris Chapman is on the verge of losing everything: his father’s trust, his role at the helm of the family business, and his wife’s respect. Kat Chapman is already fed up with hosting her critical, stuck-up in-laws and their impossibly inflexible holiday traditions. Her solution? Invite her working-class parents – born and bred Islanders – for Christmas, much to the horror of the Chapmans, whose rule that “We do not share Christmas with other people” is about to be broken.
 
As the snow piles up, so do the grievances: their teenagers—fiercely liberal Leah and conservative golden-boy Chip—are locked in a battle of wits, Chris’s vaguely corrupt brother Cormac and his calculating trophy wife are stirring the pot, and Kat’s mother is holding onto a secret that could upend the entire game. 
 
Deliciously messy and surprisingly tender, The Bluff is a feisty festive family drama about money, marriage, power, and all the things we bring to the holiday table besides the turkey.

 
“A heartfelt dive into the complexities of family and tradition. The Bluff captures the perfect storm that occurs when two different worlds collide during the holidays. An evocative must-read for anyone who has ever attempted the delicate dance of a family Christmas.” –Susan Wiggs, #1 New York Times Bestselling Author
 

Wade Rouse is an internationally bestselling author of thirteen books, which have been translated into twenty languages and selected as Today Show Must-Reads, Indie Next Picks and Michigan Notable Books. Rouse writes fiction under his grandma’s name, Viola Shipman, to honor the working-poor Ozarks woman whose memory inspires his writing. He lives in Michigan and California, and hosts Wine & Words with Wade, a literary happy hour, every Thursday.