Steps and Exes

(Paperback)

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Description

For all fans of Carol Shields and Jane Smiley: a warm, wise and wonderful evocation of family love and redemption set on an island off Seattle. No family is ordinary, but this family is less ordinary than most...When Sunny returns to her mother's house on Isadora Island off the west coast of Seattle with her small daughter, Brio, in tow, she's in retreat from her mad, difficult life in LA. Celia's famous B&B, Henry's House, a tranquil oasis, seems the perfect place to recover and give Brio a sense of real family life. But Celia's life has been anything but ordinary. Strong, beautiful and independent, with a tragedy in her past, Celia has always believed in unfettered love, and took many male lovers and partners, and had children by a number of them. Her three children, half-sisters Sunny, Victoria and Elizabeth, have followed different paths to their mother: Sunny, nursing her own secret; Victoria, secretly married to her husband years ago but too scared to tell the disapproving Celia; and Celia's favourite, the free-spirited Bethie, who has just announced her engagement to Wade, an ex-drug addict survivor who now runs a personal development programme for other 'Re-coverees'. The whole extended family gather on the Island at Henry's House for Bethie's engagement party, and there the true strength of family love is put to the test...

Author Bio

Laura Kalpakian is the author of Graced Land which was published by Flamingo. She lives in Washington State and is working on her next novel. Graced Land was praised as An absorbing tale of hardship, love and the value of holding true to convictions. Kalpakians characters are a spirited lot who totally involve the readers interest and emotions. (Publishers Weekly)