With echoes of Rules of Civility and The Boston Girl, a compelling and thought-provoking novel set in postwar New York City, about two women—one Jewish, one a WASP—and the wholly unexpected consequences of their meeting.
One rainy morning in June, two years after the end of World War II, a minor traffic accident brings together Eleanor Moskowitz and Patricia Bellamy. Their encounter seems fated: Eleanor, a teacher and recent Vassar graduate, needs a job. Patricia’s difficult thirteen-year-old daughter Margaux, recovering from polio, needs a private tutor.
Though she feels out of place in the Bellamys’ rarefied and elegant Park Avenue milieu, Eleanor forms an instant bond with Margaux. Soon the idealistic young woman is filling the bright young girl’s mind with Shakespeare and Latin. Though her mother, a hat maker with a little shop on Second Avenue, disapproves, Eleanor takes pride in her work, even if she must use the name "Moss" to enter the Bellamys’ restricted doorman building each morning, and feels that Patricia’s husband, Wynn, may have a problem with her being Jewish.
Invited to keep Margaux company at the Bellamys’ country home in a small town in Connecticut, Eleanor meets Patricia’s unreliable, bohemian brother, Tom, recently returned from Europe. The spark between Eleanor and Tom is instant and intense. Flushed with new romance and increasingly attached to her young pupil, Eleanor begins to feel more comfortable with Patricia and much of the world she inhabits. As the summer wears on, the two women’s friendship grows—until one hot summer evening, a line is crossed, and both Eleanor and Patricia will have to make important decisions—choices that will reverberate through their lives.
Gripping and vividly told, Not Our Kind illuminates the lives of two women on the cusp of change—and asks how much our pasts can and should define our futures.
Jervey Tervalon delivered a marvelous read (USA TODAY) in Dead Above Ground, his national bestselling
novel of a troubled Southern family. Now his literary landscape shifts to the West Coast, in this compelling portrayal of a young black university professor ...
In this tender and funny novel, award-winning author Hilma Wolitzer mines the unpredictable fallout of
suddenly becoming single later in life, and the chaos and joys of falling in love the second time around. When Edward Schuyler, a modest and ...
Catching a killer is dangerous—especially if he lives next doorFrom the hugely talented author of
The Kind Worth Killing comes an exquisitely chilling tale of a young suburban wife with a history of psychological instability whose fears about her new ...
In author Loretta Nyhan’s warm, witty, and wonderful novel, a widow discovers an unexpected chance
to start over—right in her own backyard.Paige Moresco found her true love in eighth grade—and lost him two years ago. Since his death, she’s been ...
From national bestselling author K'wan comes a novel about one of the deadliest women to
ever happen to the streets—Eve.The only family Eve Panelli has ever known is the infamous Twenty Gang. Orphaned as a small child, Eve quickly learned ...
[A] heartbreaking novel about the devastations of severed attachments.” —NPRFor Clay Blackall, a lifelong resident
of Providence, Rhode Island, the place has become an obsession. Here live the only people who can explain what happened to his brother, Eli, whose ...
Hustlin' for life, or is life hustlin' her? After partying and grindin' in Las Vegas
and clearing more than $100,000 and a bag of stolen diamonds, twenty-two-year-old Kennedy Sanchez, a beautiful, street-smart single mom, and her cousin Nina fly back ...
LONGLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZENamed a Best of the Year Selection by Kirkus Reviews,
the San Francisco Chronicle, Commonweal Magazine, and the Library of MichiganIn his widely acclaimed and ambitious debut novel, David Means, one of America’s greatest living ...
