5
1
Paperback(Original)
$13.99
-
PICK UP IN STORECheck Availability at Nearby Stores
Available within 2 business hours
Related collections and offers
13.99
In Stock
Overview
“Bache writes straight from the heart, peopling her pages with characters you will never forget.” —Lee Smith, author of Fair and Tender Ladies
“Ellyn Bache draws her characters from the inside.” —Baltimore Sun
Critically acclaimed author Ellyn Bache captivates with The Art of Saying Goodbye, a beautiful and poignant story of four suburban women who gain new insights and appreciations of their own lives when a much-loved neighbor falls gravely ill. In the tradition of Kristin Hannah’s Firefly Lane and Marisa de los Santos’s Belong to Me, Bache’s The Art of Saying Goodbye is a beautiful and touching story of friendship, love, commitment, and self-discovery that will enthrall readers of Jodi Picault and Jill Barnett.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780062033680 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | HarperCollins |
| Publication date: | 06/07/2011 |
| Edition description: | Original |
| Pages: | 352 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.20(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.90(d) |
Read an Excerpt
The Art of Saying Goodbye
A NovelBy Ellyn Bache
William Morrow Paperbacks
Copyright © 2011 Ellyn BacheAll right reserved.
ISBN: 9780062033680
Chapter One
On this warm October night, if you turned into BrightwoodTrace beside the handsome brick entryway, and followed the
graceful curve of Brightwood Circle past the three cul-de-sacs
that branch off like fingers, you'd notice even through
the gathering fog that a white bow with long streamers, one
that might look good atop a large wedding present, has been
secured to a tree in front of every house. Every house. This is
not because of hostages in some foreign country or a deeply
felt political cause. The residents put them up to support one
of their own. Paisley Lamm lives at the top of Lindenwood
Court, the highest point in the development, and has to pass
this way on every trip in or out.
No one is sure who tied the first ribbon to a tree this
afternoon. Most people think it was Andrea Chess,
Paisley's longtime friend, who knows her better than anyone in
Brightwood Trace except Paisley's husband, Mason. Andrea
is the one with the mushroom-colored hair falling in a bowl
around her face, and those odd gray-green eyes that seem
somehow colorless, like slightly dirty water. You wouldn't
imagine Andrea as Paisley's best friend, but she is. For twelve
years they've shared secrets, seen each other through every
crisis, given each other space. In Andrea's view, this has led
to a special, dignified friendship few women ever enjoy.
Andrea loves Paisley like a sister.
Most of the neighbors are much more ambivalent. Paisley
is pleasant to everyone, so affable and good natured the
women find it hard to stay jealous even after their husbands
stare longingly at her at a party and it ruins their night. They
burn hot for a day or two, incensed that a woman of forty
six should look so good. It's unnatural. Then on Monday
or Tuesday they run into Paisley at the supermarket or in
the gym, where she offers a tomboyish wave and spills
benevolence onto them from her snappy blue eyes. "Hey," she
trills, and "Hey," they call back, and at that moment their
ill will vanishes like smoke. There's something irresistible
about Paisley. There's something that makes her seem the
gracious hostess even in the grocery store. The next time
Paisley issues an invitation for coffee or wine, the neighbor
will say, yes, of course, and forget until it's too late the way
her husband looked at Paisley that time and probably will
again.
Of course, Iona Feld doesn't feel this way. At sixty, Iona
is practically old enough to be Paisley's mother—maybe not
quite—and hasn't been much interested in men since her
husband died. The only man in her life now is her grown
stepson, who is trouble enough. Iona isn't jealous of Paisley,
and she knows too much to be an ardent admirer, but she
enjoys her all the same. At Paisley and Mason's many social
gatherings, she watches with wry amusement the way Paisley
works a room. The more aware Paisley is of men eyeing her,
the more conscientious she is about distributing her charms
with judicious fairness, a little for John, a little for Eddie,
some for the women, too. It's almost an art form. Iona is sure
Paisley's parents impressed on her that it was important to be
nice to everyone. She sees Paisley teaching this same lesson to
her two daughters. The younger girl, Melody, isn't much
interested yet, but Brynne, at fourteen, already exhibits more
social savvy than some women ever acquire.
This morning, Iona fought alarm, irritation, and an actual
lump in her throat while driving to A. C. Moore to buy the
biggest white bow she could find. Afterward, she didn't stop
at the Quick-Mart to get the coffee she can barely live without
or pick up the dry cleaning that has been sitting there for
a week. She was furious at being sucked into this ordinary,
unexotic tragedy. She's had her own tragedy. She doesn't
need this. At home she tied the ribbon around the enormous
willow oak in her front yard, a tree she has always despised,
while its rough gray bark practically glowered disapproval at
having to wear a shiny white bow. In a few weeks the tree
will retaliate by shedding thousands of tiny pointed leaves
onto Iona's lawn, impossible to rake up. Much as she likes
yard work and believes it keeps her limber, she'll have to call
the lawn ser vice. It isn't the expense she begrudges; it is the
admission of defeat.
By nightfall when the fog begins to gather, Iona is so
worked up that she'd like nothing better than to take one of
her long treks through the undeveloped field behind Lindenwood
Court, her usual way of burning off energy. But it's
dark, and the ground back there is too uneven to negotiate
without a flashlight. She doesn't want to walk on the street.
Just her luck, she'd run into some gossipy neighbor who'd
whisper about Paisley for twenty minutes. She goes into her
house instead, picks up the newspaper, and fumes.
Up on Lindenwood Court, across the cul-de-sac from
Paisley's house, Ginger Logan stands rigid at her bedroom
window, watching her twelve-year-old daughter, Rachel,
slip quietly out into the front yard. It's all she can do not
to follow Rachel outside. They had their family discussion
about Paisley's situation at dinner. Theoretically, there's
nothing more to say. Ginger wishes Paisley well, of course;
they've been across-the-cul-de-sac neighbors for more than
nine years. But mostly, she's concerned about her children.
Well, not so much about Max who at fifteen wants only to
drive. She worries more about her daughter. Twelve is such
an impressionable age. Lately Rachel has become thoughtful
and quiet, no longer a jabbering child. Ginger wants to act
before it's too late. Do something. Make sure her daughter is
not scarred by this, whatever happens.
It's so misty out in the yard that Ginger can just barely
make out the way Rachel touches the ribbon tied around
their oak tree and then turns to stare at the nearly invisible
Lamm house across the street. The Lamms and the Logans
are neighbors but not exactly friends. Paisley's daughter,
Brynne, is two years older than Rachel, a barrier thicker than
this fog. For as long as anyone can remember, all Rachel has
wanted to do is be Brynne. Tonight she's probably thinking
that if this terrible thing is happening to Brynne—well, to
her mother—then it could happen to anyone.
Ginger watches as Rachel hugs herself against air fluffy as
wisps of cotton, soft but creepy. She watches as Rachel turns
her attention to the indecipherable sky. Until she donned her
mask of silence, Rachel often gushed dramatically that, on
an ordinary, cloudless night, the bowl of sky above Lindenwood
Court revealed more stars than anywhere else in the
neighborhood. Some of the lights moved and even blinked,
because Lindenwood Court was in the middle of the landing
pattern for the airport down in the city. It was hard to tell
the difference between planes earthbound for landing and
fixed points of light that stayed forever in the sky. "Imagine!"
Rachel would say. There was something mysterious
about this, and thrilling.
But tonight, Ginger doubts her daughter believes in a
benevolence that allows stars and planes to share the heavens
so comfortably. She doubts she believes in anything, beyond
this claustrophobic fog.
She waits until she hears Rachel come into the house and
go up to her room. Then she heads down the hall to comfort
her. But there is such silence behind Rachel's door, it's as if
Rachel is hardly breathing. As if she's thinking with all her
might, Don't come in. Don't come in. Almost a prayer.
Ginger moves away.
It's only a little after nine, but all of Brightwood Trace is
home now, too distraught for meetings or errands or visits
with friends. They are all inside, sheltering themselves,
cocooning into postures of comfort that don't actually help.
Andrea Chess sits on the lip of the garden tub in her master
bathroom, hiding from her husband and daughter, clenching
and unclenching her fists. Iona Feld reads and rereads the
front page of her paper, not taking it in. Ginger, who hasn't
gone to church for years, phones a friend who belongs to a
prayer circle and asks her to add Paisley's name to the list.
In the third house on Dogwood Terrace, Julianne Havelock
paces back and forth in her kitchen for such a long time
that her seventeen-year-old son, Toby—the only one of her
three sons who still lives at home—turns off the TV and
comes in to ask if she's all right.
"I'm fine. Just upset," she says, though she hasn't been fine
for days. More than anyone, Julianne knows what's going
on. She knew how things would turn out even while Paisley
and Mason were waiting for the definitive word. She knew
from the beginning. And this . . . this foreknowledge . . . is
eerie. She might as well be a palm reader or a gypsy with a
crystal ball. Moving into the front hallway, she squints out
the window toward her maple tree with its bow. She doesn't
see it. She is like everyone else. It is not invisible just because
of the fog.
As they put up the bows today, Julianne thinks, everyone
in Brightwood Trace must have acted by rote. None of them
could possibly have thought about what they were doing.
The situation is, in the most literal sense, unthinkable. They
are in shock. At the beginning of this unknowable journey,
they sense—especially Julianne, Andrea, Ginger, and Iona—
that this is happening not just to Paisley, but to them all.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The Art of Saying Goodbye by Ellyn Bache Copyright © 2011 by Ellyn Bache. Excerpted by permission of William Morrow Paperbacks. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
From the B&N Reads Blog
Page 1 of