Zoe Fishman

A Novel

Fun Widow's Book Tour

For readers of Jodi Picoult and Jamie Attenberg, this provocative and powerful novel from the bestselling author of Inheriting Edith explores the meaning of family, the invisibility of addiction, and the unpredictability and all-encompassing nature of grief. Sylvie Snow is a hard-working career woman, wife and mother who lives in a beautiful house and drives a beautiful car. She moisturizes regularly and wears expensive clothes. She does the grocery shopping, the laundry, the scheduling, the schlepping and the PTA-ing. She’s planning a Bar Mitzvah for her movie-loving twelve year old son, Teddy, even though he’s wholly disinterested in it. She’s also newly addicted to the Oxycontin intended for her husband, Paul who has just broken his ankle. For three years, Sylvie has repressed her grief about the heartbreaking stillbirth of her daughter, Delilah. On the morning of the anniversary of her death, when she just can’t face doing one...more...thing: she takes one—just one—of her husband’s discarded pain pills. And suddenly she feels patient, kinder, and miraculously relaxed. She tells herself that the pills are temporary, just a gift, and that when the supply runs out she’ll go back to her regularly scheduled programming. But days turn into weeks, and Sylvie slips slowly into a nightmare. At first, Paul and Teddy are completely unaware, but this changes quickly as her desperate choices reveal her desperate state. As the Bar Mitzvah nears, all three of them must face the void within themselves, both alone and together.

Invisible as Air

A poignant breakout novel, for fans of J. Courtney Sullivan and Elin Hilderbrand, about a single mother who inherits a beautiful beach house with a caveat—she must take care of the ornery elderly woman who lives in it. For years, Maggie Sheets has been an invisible hand in the glittering homes of wealthy New York City clients, scrubbing, dusting, mopping, and doing all she can to keep her head above water as a single mother. Everything changes when a former employer dies leaving Maggie a staggering inheritance. A house in Sag Harbor. The catch? It comes with an inhabitant: The deceased’s eighty-two-year old mother Edith. Edith has Alzheimer’s—or so the doctors tell her—but she remembers exactly how her daughter Liza could light up a room, or bring dark clouds in her wake. And now Liza’s gone, by her own hand, and Edith has been left—like a chaise or strand of pearls—to a poorly dressed young woman with a toddler in tow. Maggie and Edith are both certain this arrangement will be an utter disaster. But as summer days wane, a tenuous bond forms, and Edith, who feels the urgency of her diagnosis, shares a secret that she’s held close for five decades, launching Maggie on a mission that might just lead them each to what they are looking for.

Inheriting Edith

Der Sommer der Frauen. Maggie hat alle Mühe, für sich und ihre kleine Tochter zu sorgen. Dann erbt sie ein Strandhaus in den Hamptons und könnte auf einen Schlag alle Probleme los sein – sofern sie sich um die darin lebende 82-jährige Edith kümmert, die an Alzheimer erkrankt ist. Doch Edith hat überhaupt keine Lust, ihr Heim mit einer schlechtgekleideten Fremden und einem trotzigen Kleinkind zu teilen. Aber dann verschlimmert sich ihr Zustand, und in ihrer Not, ihre Erinnerung zu verlieren, lässt sie es zu, dass Maggie ihr hilft, ein Geheimnis ihrer Vergangenheit zu lüften. Und so erleben die so unterschiedlichen Frauen einen einzigartigen Sommer der Neuanfänge. “Ein tragikomischer Lesegenuss und eine köstliche literarische Hühnersuppe für die Seele.“ Mary Kay Andrews.

Roman

Die Frauen von Long Island

When Ruth returns home to the South for the summer after her freshman year at college, a near tragedy pushes her to uncover family truths and take a good look at the woman she wants to become. Growing up in Alabama, all Ruth Wasserman wanted was to be a blond Baptist cheerleader. But as a curly-haired Jew with a rampant sweet tooth and a smart mouth, this was an impossible dream. Not helping the situation was her older brother, David, a soccer star whose good looks, smarts, and popularity reigned at school and at home. College provided an escape route and Ruth took it. Now home for the summer, she's back lifeguarding and coaching alongside David, and although the job is the same, nothing else is. She's a prisoner of her low self-esteem and unhealthy relationship with food, David is closed off and distant in a way he's never been before, and their parents are struggling with the reality of an empty nest. When a near drowning happens on their watch, a storm of repercussions forces Ruth and David to confront long-ignored truths about their town, their family, and themselves.

Saving Ruth

Sometimes life's most fulfilling journeys begin without a map An executive at a New York cosmetics firm, Sarah has had her fill of the interminable hustle of the big city. When her husband, Josh, is offered a new job in suburban Virginia, it feels like the perfect chance to shift gears. While Josh quickly adapts to their new life, Sarah discovers that having time on her hands is a mixed blessing. Without her everyday urban struggles, who is she? And how can she explain to Josh, who assumes they are on the same page, her ambivalence about starting a family? It doesn't help that the idea of getting behind the wheel—an absolute necessity of her new life—makes it hard for Sarah to breathe. It's been almost twenty years since she's driven, and just the thought of merging is enough to make her teeth chatter with anxiety. When she signs up for lessons, she begins to feel a bit more like her old self again, but she's still unsure of where she wants to go. Then a crisis involving her best friend lands Sarah back in New York—a trip to the past filled with unexpected truths about herself, her dear friend, and her seemingly perfect sister-in-law . . . and an astonishing surprise that will help her see the way ahead.

Driving Lessons

“Anyone who has wondered, ‘Now what?’ about her life will relate to Zoe Fishman’s ebullient and wise novel Balancing Acts. The pages flew by.” —Valerie Frankel, author of Thin Is the New Happy Zoe Fishman’s Balancing Acts is a must for fans of The Friday Night Knitting Club, The Reading Group, The Jane Austen Book Club, and Girls in Trucks. The charming and poignant stories of four former college friends going through mid-life crises who help each other balance their former dreams with their present lives through the power of yoga and friendship, Balancing Acts brims with wit, sensitivity, and wisdom—with characters women readers can really relate to and take into their hearts.

Balancing Acts

Met haar opvallende schoonheid, een goed stel hersens en een dikbetaalde baan op Wall Street lijkt Charlie de gelukkigste vrouw ter wereld te zijn. Tot ze dertig wordt en de balans van haar leven opmaakt. Ze besluit alles op te geven en zich geheel te wijden aan haar droom: een eigen yogaschool. Op een reünie van de middelbare school komt ze opnieuw in contact met drie vroegere klasgenoten, voor wie het volwassen leven evenmin heeft gebracht waarop ze hadden gehoopt. Redacteur Sabine koestert de stille wens om zelf een boek te schrijven; de ooit aanstormende hippe fotograaf Naomi is nu een alleenstaande moeder en heeft haar camera al in geen jaren meer aangeraakt; en Bess, die droomde van een carrière als onderzoeksjournalist, schrijft voor een roddelblad. De drie laten zich door Charlie overhalen een yogacursus voor beginners bij haar te volgen. Die wekelijkse ontmoetingen zullen hun levens voorgoed veranderen

Zoe Fishman

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