Elizabeth Berg

Cautious, conventional Anne shares a deep bond of friendship with the outspoken and eccentric Ruth, building an honest, open relationship that evolves into something deeper when Ruth is diagnosed with cancer. Reader's Guide included. Reprint. 20,000 first printing.

Is it ever too late to make up for the past? Laura Bartone looks forward to her annual family reunion with a mixture of excitement and wariness. Every year, she and her siblings return to their parents' home outside Minneapolis to attend the state fair. This year, things are different. As soon as she arrives, Laura realizes that something is not right with her sister Caroline. On their first evening together, Caroline confronts Laura and their brother Steve with devastating allegations about their mother. Taken aback and incredulous, the siblings are unable to reconcile their perception of their childhood. A sudden tragedy forces them to face the past, their own culpability and their need for love and forgiveness.

After the death of her husband, Betta Nolan fulfills her promise to him to move to a small town and build a new life for herself, following her as she strives to cope with her grief and find pleasure and solace in the ordinary things of everyday life--a warm bath, good food, the beauty of nature, art, and her garden. Reader's Guide included. Reprint. 125,000 first printing.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER - Revelations about a seemingly ordinary mother force her adult children to reexamine their lives in this "absorbing novel about family secrets" (The Dallas Morning News). Laura Bartone anticipates her annual family reunion in Minnesota with a mixture of excitement and wariness. Yet this year's gathering will prove to be much more trying than either she or her siblings imagined. As soon as she arrives, Laura realizes that something is not right with her sister. Forever wrapped up in events of long ago, Caroline is the family's restless black sheep. When Caroline confronts Laura and their brother, Steve, with devastating allegations about their mother, the three have a difficult time reconciling their varying experiences in the same house. But a sudden misfortune will lead them all to face the past, their own culpability, and their common need for love and forgiveness. Readers have come to love Elizabeth Berg for the "lucent beauty of her] prose, the verity of her insights, and the tenderness of her regard for her fellow human" (Booklist). In The Art of Mending, she confronts some of the deepest mysteries of life, as she explores how even the largest sins can be forgiven by the smallest gestures, and how grace can come to many through the trials of one.

When is a marriage worth saving, and when is it worth letting go?'He felt his stomach tighten, his heart begin to race. Praise for Elizabeth Berg'Heartwrenching-Hilarious-Berg sits somewhere between Anne Tyler and Alice Hoffman.' Chicago Sun-Times 'Maybe Freud didn't know the answer to what women want, but Elizabeth Berg certainly does.' USA Today

A searing, evocative novel of a family in turmoil focuses on a family whose ordinary life has been shattered by unexpected revelations, in a story told from the perspective of a husband who must work through denial and anguish to redemption and personal responsibility after he overnight goes from lover to roommate. Reprint. 100,000 first printing.

At odds with her life, Nan, a married forty-something, begins an impromptu trek across the country, inspired by a leather journal she sees in a bookstore, which she knows she must buy and fill.

As Jay lies in a coma, his young wife, Lainey, is the only one who believes he will ever recover. As she struggles to keep believing and to keep the family going, she goes deeper into herself, looking for solace, strength, and understanding.

'Until that moment, I hadn't realized how much I'd been needing to meet someone I might be able to say everything to.' They met at a party. It was hate at first sight. Ruth was far too beautiful, too flamboyant. Not at all Ann's kind of person. Until a chance encounter in the bathroom led to an alliance of souls. Soon they were sharing hankies during the late showing of Sophie's World, wolfing down sundaes sodden with whipped cream, telling truths of marriage, mortality and love, secure in a kind of intimacy no man could ever know. After years of shared secrets, guilty pleasures, family life and divorce, they face a crisis that redefines the meaning of friendship and unconditional love. This is the story of Ruth. Of Ann. And of all of us who wonder what we'd say if we knew we didn't have forever.

In this warm and engaging novel, New York Times bestselling author Elizabeth Berg revisits the heroine she so lovingly brought to life in Joy School. It is 1961, and thirteen-year-old Katie is facing a summer full of conflict. First, instead of letting her find her own work for the season, Katie's father has arranged for two less than ideal baby-sitting jobs. Worse, Katie has been forcibly inducted into the 'loser' Girl Scout troop organized by her only friend Cynthia's controlling and clueless mother. A much anticipated visit to her former home in Texas and ex-best friend Cherylanne proves disappointing. And then comes an act of betrayal that leaves Katie questioning her views on friendship, on her ability not to take those she loves for granted, and most important, on herself. Full of anguish and the joys of adolescence in a much more innocent time, True to Form is sure to make readers remember and reflect upon their own moments of discovery and self-definition. 'Berg oozes warmth, wisdom and generosity of spirit. Her writing is quite brilliant, as soft as a kiss, as sharp as a knife. An American Maeve Binchy, a modern-day Jane Austen, whatever praise you heap on Elizabeth Berg, she probably deserves it.' Anna Maxted 'Berg knows her characters intimately … showing them with compassion, humour, and an illuminating generosity … she gets under their skin and leaves the reader with an indelible impression of lives challenged and changed.' The Seattle Times 'Savvy, wry, and sharply observant … Berg's graceful and deceptively simple prose is laced with clear-eyed insights … deft and inspiring.' The Denver Post

Desperate for marriage and motherhood but impossibly in love with the wrong man, real estate agent Patty Hansen comes up with an ingenious, if offbeat, solution to accomplishing her goals.

Exploring diverse facets of women's lives, a collection of short fiction by the best-selling author of Open House reflects on seemingly ordinary and insignificant moments in life when events and memories come together to create a sense of wholeness and understanding in such works as "White Dwarf," "Today's Special," and the title story. Reprint. 60,000 first printing.

"Sometimes life is so hard and then, bingo, it's like happiness is pushing at your back, waiting to come out of your front...." On the hot Texas army base she calls home, Katie spends the lazy days of her summer waiting: waiting to grow up; waiting for Dickie Mack to fall in love with her; waiting for her breasts to blossom; waiting for the beatings to stop. Since their mother died, Katie and her older sister, Diane, have been struggling to understand their distant, often violent father. Diane escapes into the arms of her boyfriend. Katie hides in her room or escapes to her best friend's house - until Katie's admiration for her strong-willed sister leads her on an adventure that transforms her life. About Durable Goods Christopher Tilghman has said, "Elizabeth Berg's prose and passion come at us with all the deceptive strength of her heroine." Written with an unerring ability to capture the sadness of growth, the pain of change, the nearly visible vibrations that connect people, this beautiful novel reminds us of how wonderful, and wounding, a deeper understanding of life can be.

In this exquisite new novel by bestselling writer Elizabeth Berg, a young woman falls in love -- and learns how sorrow can lead to an understanding of joy. Katie, the narrator, has relocated to Missouri with her distant, occasionally abusive father, and she feels very much alone: her much-loved mother is dead; her new school is unaccepting of her; and her only friends fall far short of being ideal companions. When she accidentally falls through the ice while skating, she meets Jimmy. He is handsome, far older than she, and married, but she is entranced. As their relationship unfolds, so too does Katie's awareness of the pain and intensity first love can bring. Beautifully written in Berg's irresistible voice, Joy School portrays the soaring happiness of real love, the deep despair one can feel when it goes unrequited, and the stubbornness of hope that will not let us let go. Here also is recognition that love can come in many forms and offer many different things. Joy School illuminates, too, how the things that hurt the most can sometimes teach us the lessons that really matter. About Durable Goods, Elizabeth Berg's first novel, Andre Dubus said, "Elizabeth Berg writes with humor and a big heart about resilience, loneliness, love and hope. And the transcendence that redeems." The same will be said of Joy School, Elizabeth Berg's most luminous novel to date.

Unmarried at 51, Myra Lipinsky has endured the isolation of her middle life by immersing herself in her home nursing career. Now Chip Reardon is assigned to be her new patient. He is an old school friend who, with an incurable illness, has returned home to New England to spend his remaining days.

Patty Murphy is facing that pivotal point in a woman's life when her biological clock ticks as insistently as a beating heart. Will she find Mr. Right and start a family? But Patty is in love--with a man who is not only attractive and financially sound, but sensitive and warmhearted. There's just one small problem: He is also gay. Against her better judgment, and pleas from family and friends, Patty refuses to give up on Ethan. Every man she dates ultimately leaves her aching for the gentle comfort and intimacy she shares with him. But even as she throws eligible bachelors to the wayside to spend yet another platonic night with Ethan, Patty longs more and more for the consolation of loving and being loved. In the meantime she must content herself with waiting--until the real thing comes along. . . . "Touching . . . [A] deft, sweet, and often comic novel."--Chicago Tribune"THIS NOVEL MAKES FOR PLEASANT READING . . . PATTY MURPHY IS APPEALINGLY VULNERABLE. . . . NOVELIST ELIZABETH BERG HAS AN ENGAGING VOICE AND STYLE."--Los Angeles Times"A PERCEPTIVE COMEDY OF MODERN MANNERS . . . At the end of each undemanding day, Patty goes home to an empty apartment and listens to her biological clock ticking as ominously as Captain Hook's crocodile. . . . Patty wants a husband and a baby, and not necessarily in that order. . . . But Patty has a problem. Try as she might, there is only one man she can love--her best friend, Ethan--and try as Ethan might, he is quite firmly and intractably gay. With rueful good humor, Until the Real Thing Comes Along shows how Patty and Ethan come to terms with the impossibility of having it all."--The Boston Globe"BERG WRITES WITH HUMOR AND UNDERSTANDING ABOUT MATTERS OF THE HEART. . . . The author's generous view of humanity is evident in her characters, who walk right off the page they are so well and truly drawn."--St. Louis Post Dispatch"ENTERTAINING . . . FLAWLESS DIALOGUE . . . READING IT IS LIKE EAVESDROPPING ON AN INTIMATE FEMALE CHAT."--New York Daily News"COMPELLING . . . [A] WARMLY TOLD TALE."--People

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 problem is money. To meet her mortgage payments, Sam decides to take in boarders. The first is an older woman who offers sage advice and sorely needed comfort; the second, a maladjusted student, is not quite so helpful. A new friend, King, an untraditional man, suggests that Samantha get out, get going, get work. But her real work is this: In order to emerge from grief and the past, she has to learn how to make her own happiness. In order to really see people, she has to look within her heart. And in order to know who she is, she has to remember--and reclaim--the person she used to be, long before she became someone else in an effort to save her marriage. Open House is a love story about what can blossom between a man and a woman, and within a woman herself.

Do you ever really know your mother, your daughter, the people in your family? In this rich and rewarding new novel by the beloved bestselling author of Talk Before Sleep and The Pull of the Moon, a reunion between two sisters and their mother reveals how the secrets and complexities of the past have shaped the lives of the women in a family. Ginny Young is on a plane, en route to see her mother, whom she hasn't seen or spoken to for thirty-five years. She thinks back to the summer of 1958, when she and her sister, Sharla, were young girls. At that time, a series of dramatic events--beginning with the arrival of a mysterious and sensual next-door neighbor--divided the family, separating the sisters from their mother. Moving back and forth in time between the girl she once was and the woman she's become, Ginny at last confronts painful choices that occur in almost any woman's life, and learns surprising truths about the people she thought she knew best. Emotional honesty and a true understanding of people and relationships are combined in this moving and deeply satisfying new book by the novelist who "writes with humor and a big heart about resilience, love and hope. And the transcendence that redeems" (Andre Dubus).