Elizabeth Berg
1) Open house
Author
Language
English
Appears on list
Description
"In this superb novel by the beloved author of Talk Before Sleep, The Pull of the Moon, and Until the Real Thing Comes Along, a woman re-creates her life after divorce by opening up her house and her heart.
Samantha's husband has left her, and after a spree of overcharging at Tiffany's, she settles down to reconstruct a life for herself and her eleven-year-old son. Her eccentric mother tries to help by fixing her up with dates, but a more pressing...
Author
Language
English
Description
"Cecilia Ross is looking for a change. She has decided to take time off from her job as a successful motivational speaker and sell her home. She moves in to a beautiful old house in St. Paul, Minnesota, complete with a big front porch, a wild garden, a chef's kitchen--and three roommates. The four women are different ages, but all are feeling restless, and want to take a roadtrip to find again the people and things they miss. One woman wants to connect...
Author
Language
English
Description
"Truluv is a moving novel about three people who have lost the person they love most, and must find their way back to happiness. Arthur, a widower, meets Maddy, an angry and friendless teenage girl, while visiting his late wife at the cemetary, where he goes every day for lunch. Against all odds, the two strike up a friendship that pulls them out of a serious rut. They band together with Arthur's nosy neighbor Lucille, to create lives that are truly...
Author
Language
English
Description
""George Sand was a 19th century French novelist known not only for her novels but even more for her scandalous behavior. After leaving her estranged husband, Sand moved to Paris where she wrote, wore men's clothing, smoked cigars, and had love affairs with famous men and an actress named Marie. In an era of incredible artistic talent, Sand was the most famous female writer of her time. Her lovers and friends included Frederic Chopin, Gustave Flaubert,...
Author
Language
English
Description
The decades melt away as newly divorced Dorothy Shauman, class beauty Candy Armstrong, veterinarian and widower Lester Hessenpfeffer, and other classmates gather for a fortieth reunion.
To each of the men and women in "The last time I saw you", this reunion means something different. A last opportunity to say something long left unsaid, an escape from the bleaker realities of everyday life, a means to save a marriage on the rocks, or an opportunity...
Author
Language
English
Description
Nola McCollum is the most desirable girl in Arthur's class, and he is thrilled when they become friends. But Arthur wants far more than friendship. Unfortunately, Nola has a crush on the wrong Moses, Arthur's older brother, Frank, who is busy pursuing his own love interest and avoiding the boys father, a war veteran with a drinking problem and a penchant for starting fights. When a sudden tragedy rocks the family's world, Arthur struggles to come...
8) What we keep
Author
Language
English
Description
Ginny Young boards a plane to reunite with her mother, whom she has not seen in over three decades, and recalls the summer in 1950s rural Wisconsin when she turned twelve years old and her life changed forever.
Author
Language
English
Appears on list
Description
It is the summer of 1964. In Tupelo, Mississippi, the town of Elvis's birth, tensions are mounting over civil-rights demonstrations occurring ever more frequently--and violently--across the state. But in Paige Dunn's small, ramshackle house, there are more immediate concerns. Challenged by the effects of the polio she contracted during her last month of pregnancy, Paige is nonetheless determined to live as normal a life as possible and to raise her...
Author
Language
English
Description
Lucille Howard is getting on in years, but she stays busy. Thanks to the inspiration of her dearly departed friend Arthur Truluv, she has begun to teach baking classes, sharing the secrets to her delicious classic Southern yellow cake, the perfect pinwheel cookies, and other sweet essentials. Her classes have become so popular that she's hired Iris, a new resident of Mason, Missouri, as an assistant. Iris doesn't know how to bake but she needs to...
Author
Language
English
Description
Betta Nolan moves to a small town after the death of her husband to try to begin anew. Pursuing a dream of a different kind of life, she is determined to find pleasure in her simply daily routines. Among those who help her in both expected and unexpected ways are the ten-year-old boy next door, three wild women friends from her college days, a twenty-year-old who is struggling to find his place in the world, and a handsome man who is ready for love....
Author
Language
English
Description
After sending their men off to fight in the war, sisters Kitty and Louise Heaney join their flirtatious younger sister, Tish, in writing letters to servicemen overseas, in a study of life during World War II from the perspective of the young men on the battlefield and the women left behind on the home front.
15) Never change
Author
Language
English
Description
Fifty-one-year-old Myra Lipinsky is content with her dog and her career as a visiting nurse until Chip Reardon returns. Chip was the boy Myra adored in high school. Now terminally ill, he has returned to their New England hometown to spend the rest of his life.
Author
Language
English
Description
When a group of friends in Mason, Missouri decide to start a monthly supper club, they get more than they bargained for. Instead of sharing recipes, they begin sharing secrets. When Iris Winters and Maddy Harris are invited to the club, they find that it's just what each of them needs. Iris hasn't yet told anyone about the unlikely man who has captured her attention, and Maddy has come back home to escape a problem too big for her to confront.
17) Say when
Author
Language
English
Description
Family man Griffin's happy life is shattered when his shy, bookish wife confesses an affair and requests a divorce. Will Griffin move on or fight for his marriage; forgive his wife or condemn her; deny or admit his part in the undoing of his seemingly perfect life?
Author
Language
English
Description
Recently widowed Helen Ames and her twenty-seven-year-old daughter Tessa discover that money has disappeared in several big withdrawals from the Ames' retirement savings. What Helen's husband did with all their money turns out to be provocative, revelatory--and leads Helen and her daughter to embark on new adventures, and change.
Author
Language
English
Description
"For as long as Elizabeth can remember, she has watched her father trail after her mother, kissing her multiple times a day and holding her hand. She watched her mother smooth the lines in her father's face and pay attention to his every move, even when she was desperate for some time to herself. When her parents began to age, Elizabeth and her siblings are placed in the difficult position of taking over more and more supportive roles and tasks. They...