A beautiful, bracingly honest debut novel about the triangle formed between a young woman and the couple whose life she enters one transformative year: a story about love and compassion, the fluidity of desire, and the myriad ways of devotion. Ella is nearing thirty, and not yet living the life she imagined. Her artistic ambitions as a student in Minnesota have given way to an unintended career in caregiving. One spring, Bryn--a retired carpenter--hires...

"When Vivien Walker left her home in the Mississippi Delta, she swore never to go back, as generations of the women in her family had. But in the spring, nine years to the day since she'd left, that's exactly what happens--Vivien returns, fleeing from a broken marriage and her lost dreams for children. What she hopes to find is solace with "Bootsie," her dear grandmother who raised her, a Walker woman with a knack for making everything all right....

After a rough divorce, 45-year-old Cricket has built a new life for herself in the charming small town of Azalea Lake, North Carolina. With her senior caregiving business taking off and a possible new romance brewing with a handsome neighbor, Cricket's life is looking up. But before she moves ahead, she must deal with unfinished business from the past, namely her ex-husband Knox who abandoned her without a word of explanation and has become a famous...