Olivia

by Judith Rossner

Overview

From the New York Times bestselling author of Looking for Mr. Goodbar comes the story of one family’s unfinished business and overcoming the weight of the past.

Caroline Ferrante is a gifted chef who has just been tapped for her own cooking show. But her turbid past returns to haunt her when her estranged teenage daughter, Olivia—raised to hate her by a Caroline’s vindictive ex-husband—returns home. Overcoming Olivia’s anger while navigating a new career and burgeoning love life proves to be her greatest challenge.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781476774824
Publisher:	Simon & Schuster
Publication date:	07/08/2014
Sold by:	SIMON & SCHUSTER
Format:	eBook
Pages:	334
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

Judith Rossner (1935–2005) was an American novelist, most famous for the bestseller, Looking for Mr. Goodbar (1975). A lifelong New Yorker, her books centered around the themes of urban alienation and gender relations.

Editorial Reviews

She's got a terrific job, a terrific lover, and a terrific relationship with her lover's children, but Caroline Ferrante still has a problem: her daughter, Olivia, whose father has turned her against the mother who finally abandoned an intolerable marriage.

Library Journal

Rossner's latest novel is a satisfying meditation on the complex bonds between mother and daughter. Caroline finds success as a television chef in New York after her marriage fails. Daughter Olivia, Roman Catholic by virtue of her father, has been left behind in Rome. But Caroline's life goes into a tailspin when Olivia opts to join her mother in Manhattan, while seizing upon her perceived abandonment as reason for discord in their tenuous relationship. Rossner conjures up an impeccable pastiche, juxtaposing sensual elements related to good food with the vagaries of Caroline's love affair with Leon "and" the turbulent ordeals of life with a teenage offspring. A nuanced portrayal renders Olivia's painful passage from girlhood to maturity with a particular poignancy. Yet it is the shimmering impression of Caroline--and her confused sense of self within her own family of intellectuals, where culinary talent was never an acceptable substitute for academic pursuits--that ultimately triumphs in this subtle yet compelling portrait of a woman's journey toward personal fulfillment.

Alice Joyce