Good-bye and Amen - Hardcover

Gutcheon, Beth

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060539070 ISBN 13: 9780060539078

Publisher: William Morrow, 2008

Synopsis

In a summer cottage on the coast of Maine, an unlikely love was nurtured, a marriage endured, and a family survived. Now it is time for the children of that marriage to make peace with the wounds and the treasures left to them. And to sort out which is which.

Beth Gutcheon's critically acclaimed family saga, Leeway Cottage, was a major achievement: a vivid and moving tale of war and marriage and their consequences that enchanted readers. Good-bye and Amen is the next chapter for the family of Leeway Cottage, the story of what happens when those most powerful people in any family drama, the parents, have left the stage.

The complicated marriage of the gifted Danish pianist Laurus Moss to the provincial American child of privilege Sydney Brant was a mystery to many who knew them, including their three children. Now, Eleanor, Monica, and Jimmy Moss have to decide how to divide or share what Laurus and Sydney have left them without losing one another.

Secure and cheerful Eleanor, the oldest, wants little for herself but much for her children. Monica, the least-loved middle child, brings her youthful scars to the table, as well as the baggage of a difficult marriage to the charismatic Norman, who left a brilliant legal career, though not his ambition, to become an Episcopal priest. Youngest and best-loved Jimmy, who made a train wreck of his young adulthood, has returned after a long period of alienation from the family surprisingly intact, but extremely hard for his sisters to read.

Having lived through childhoods both materially blessed and emotionally difficult, with a father who could seem uninvolved and a mother who loved a good family game of “let's you and him fight,” the Mosses have formed strong adult bonds that none of them wants to damage. But it's difficult to divide a beloved summer house three ways and keep it too. They all know what's at stake—in a world of atomized families, a house like Leeway Cottage can be the glue that keeps generations of cousins and grandchildren deeply connected to one another. But knowing it's important doesn't make it easy.

About this title

About the Author:

Beth Gutcheon is the critically acclaimed author of the novels, The New Girls, Still Missing, Domestic Pleasures, Saying Grace, Five Fortunes, More Than You Know, Leeway Cottage, and Good-bye and Amen. She is the writer of several film scripts, including the Academy-Award nominee The Children of Theatre Street. She lives in New York City.

From AudioFile:

Beth Gutcheon's sequel to the novel LEEWAY COTTAGE is ideally suited to the audiobook format. Although helpful, it's not necessary to have read the earlier work in order to understand and enjoy GOOD-BYE AND AMEN. The continuing story of the Moss family, following the parents' deaths, is told in a series of interviews. Each character is introduced before speaking, and every incident is developed from several points of view. Narrator Joyce Bean displays an impressive range of voices and accents that succeed in giving a clearly defined identity to each character. These voices, along with the introductions, allow the listener to follow the story with relative ease. Author and narrator combine to create a thoroughly enjoyable audiobook. M.O.B. © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine

About this edition

• Publisher: William Morrow
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0060539070
• ISBN 13: 9780060539078
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 256