Mary's trying to cope with her husband's drinking and worse when he announces he's found his own unique solution to her infertility. Now she faces some big decisions quickly, like where she can afford to live on a development editor's salary and whether avocado green bathroom fixtures will have to be involved.
Meanwhile, a small town cop decides he really should try to find a wife before he ends up like his last welfare check, but the last thing he needs is for anyone to know he's looking. And an Episcopal priest prays to escape his bad marriage without bothering with any of the theologically-sound caveats he should probably add to that.
Soon it's Christmas in Lawson, New Hampshire. Will these three lonely hearts get any of what they're longing for?
This is a short prequel to THE AWFUL MESS and the novels that follow it, but it also stands alone for anyone who's ever been desperate to start over.
Includes the first five chapters of THE AWFUL MESS.
Born and raised in the Tampa Bay area, Sandra Hutchison survived her parents' move to the small town of Greenfield, Massachusetts and eventually stopped sulking about it, though it's possible she's still working it out in her fiction. She worked as an acquisitions editor, marketing manager, creative director, copywriter, and adjunct English professor. She currently lives in upstate New York and is the author of a number of novels, including THE AWFUL MESS.