WINNER of a Pushcart Prize, The Flannery O' Connor Prize and The
Leapfrog Global Fiction Prize.
At forty-four, Kay Sorensen has quit drinking, smoking, and overeating,
and she has almost quit reading self-help books about quitting drinking,
smoking and overeating. She has divorced her deadbeat husband, finished
college, and landed a job she loves directing a small branch of the
county library.
But Kay still has one unconquered addiction: she just can't say no to
someone who needs her. So when her architect father insists he needs her
to move back home and care-take the empty house she grew up in, Kay is
forced to return to the site of her bitterly unhappy childhood, trying
her best to ignore the ghostly presence of her dead mother and make a
home for her and her son.
But she soon finds herself returning to the patterns of her childhood,
where she spent years trying to please her thankless father and placate
her invalid mother. When her dogmatic, born-again brother arrives, along
with a slew of men from her past all seeking a home, Kay is suddenly
playing housewife and host to five men with needs and demands she is
struggling to meet while consistently ignoring her own.
In order to find freedom and regain her selfhood, Kay must travel
halfway across the world, finally face the chattering ghosts of her
past, and break out of the mold that has been set for her by the men who
have controlled her whole life.
