an exquisite literary drama with a rippedfromthe headlines urgency golden state asks hard questions about the limits of loyalty and what it means to be a sister a daughter a wife and a mother all her life natalie askedahl has played the part of the good girl growing up as the youngest child in one of californias most prominent political families she worshipped her big brother bobby a sensitive math prodigy who served as her protector and confidante but after bobby left home at sixteen on a princeton scholarship something changed between them as bobby retreated deeper into his own head now that natalie is happily married with two young daughters a satisfying job and a house in the berkeley hills her only real regret is losing bobbythen a bomb explodes in the middle of her idealseeming life her brother is accused of carrying out a lethal campaign of terrorism against californias universities thrust into overnight notoriety natalie is torn between helping him and protecting her own family the decisions she makes will send her down a rabbit hole of confusion lies and betrayals that threaten to destroy her relationships with everyone she holds dear as her life splits irrevocably into before and after what she begins to learn is that some of the most dangerous things in the world are the stories we tell ourselves