William Morrow, March 2012
The critically acclaimed author of Good-bye and Amen,
Leeway Cottage, and More Than You Know returns
with a sharply perceptive and emotionally resonant novel about
the power of knowledge, the consequences of rumor, and the
unexpected price of friendship.
"Did you know that the origin of the word gossip in English is
'god-sibling'? It's the talk between people who are godparents
to the same child, people who have a legitimate loving interest
in the person they talk about. It's talk that weaves a net of
support and connection beneath the people you want to protect."
Loviah "Lovie" French owns a small, high-end dress shop on
Manhattan's Upper East Side. Renowned for her taste, charm, and
discretion, Lovie is the one to whom certain women turn when they
need "just the thing" for key life events -- baptisms and balls,
weddings and funerals -- or when they just want to dish in the
dressing room. Among the people who depend on Lovie's confidence
are her two best friends since boarding school days: Dinah
Wainwright and Avis Metcalf.
Outspoken and brimming with confidence, Dinah made a name for herself as a columnist covering the doings of New York's wealthiest and most fabulous. Shy, proper Avis, in many ways Dinah's opposite, rose to prominence in the art world with her quiet manners, hard work, and precise judgment. Despite the deep affection they both feel for Lovie, they have been more or less allergic to each other since a minor incident decades earlier that has been remembered and resented with what will prove to be unimaginable consequences.
These uneasy acquaintances become unwillingly bound to each other when Dinah's favorite son and Avis's only daughter fall in love and marry. On the surface, Nick and Grace are the perfect match -- a playful, romantic, buoyant, and beautiful pair. But their commitment will be strained by time and change: career setbacks, reckless choices, the birth of a child, jealousies, and rumor. At the center of their orbit is Lovie, who knows everyone's secrets and manages them as wisely as she can. Which is not wisely enough, as things turn out -- a fact that will have a shattering effect on all their lives.
An astute chronicler of everything that makes us human, Beth Gutcheon delivers her most powerful and emotionally devastating novel to date. Gossip is a tale of intimacy and betrayal, trust and fidelity, friendship, competition, and motherhood that explores the myriad ways we use and abuse "information" about others -- be it true, false, or imagined -- to sustain, and occasionally destroy, one another.
Hardcover | ISBN: 9780061931420 | Publication Date: March 2012
Reviews:
Reviews for Beth Gutcheon
"Good-bye and Amen is a tour de france of structure and
voice. Gutcheon had me at the first sentence and I didn't put the
book down until I had finished it. Marvelous and memorable."
-- Karen Joy Fowler, author of Wit's End and The
Jane Austen Book Club
"An undeniably rich, no-holds-barred portrait of an American
family."
-- Library Journal
"A great drama, cinematically told . . . [Gutcheon] writes
elegantly about the complex bonds of family."
-- Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"Beautifully written and told from varying points of view, this
sweeping saga will strike a chord with anyone who loves to read
about family. Four Stars."
-- Romantic Times
"Pure storytelling. [Gutcheon's] characters and settings are
alive, sparkling with deft touches of period detail. Riveting.
Vibrant."
-- Newsday (New York)
"[E]nthralling . . . triumphant and true."
-- Boston Globe
"Stirring. The World War II saga anchors the novel, giving it
resonance beyond the family dramas Gutcheon tells so well."
-- Los Angeles Times
"Gutcheon's tale is more than just a story of marriage; it's a
metaphor for an era."
-- Booklist