Our Review: If you are looking for a story that is completely unique then you need to check this book out. This book features strong, female characters that inspire and delight readers throughout. Still not convinced that this is your next great read? Well the author has generously granted us permission to post the first chapter, so please enjoy this sample and then grab your copy from Amazon today!
A
little book about the friendship between Jenna, the actress trying to adjust to
life as a widow, Natalie, who chose a career instead of marriage and Liz, wife/mother/grandmother/volunteer/former
cabaret singer. They think their lives are settled; they don't expect any
drastic changes but they are in for some surprises. Travel, internet dating,
family problems, new friends, computer classes, a career change, a romance and
more give them a lot of things to discuss and plan at their weekly luncheons.
They find that they can adapt to and even welcome and enjoy the life changes in
spite of or because of their age; they are (shush, don't tell) over seventy!
Check out this
excerpt from the book!
CHAPTER ONE
JENNA
The alarm clock
went off at 7:30. Jenna, as she had been doing for the last 40 years,
rolled over to give her sleeping husband a good morning hug, but all
her reaching arms found
was
a five-foot long body pillow.
When am I going to stop doing this? she asked herself as she brushed away tears that were leaking from her still unopened eyes. Phil’s gone; he’s been gone for six months, three weeks,
five
days….Stop it! she commanded. Get
up, stretch, laugh.
She was taking a yoga class
and
Donna, the petite, red haired instructor, told her students to start
the day with laughter;
deep-from-the-belly laughter. She said to do it every morning even if there was nothing to laugh about.
“Your body doesn’t know
the
difference,” Donna told the students.
“Laughing releases those happy little endorphins.
Try it.”
Jenna told herself jokes to try to bring on some laughter. “Two peanuts were walking in
an alley; one was assaulted.” She smiled. “Two cannibals were eating a clown; one said to the other, ‘Does your food taste funny?’” She giggled. “Be alert, the world needs all the lerts
it can get!” She laughed harder. They’re such stupid jokes, she thought, but she kept laughing.
They’re funny and
look at me. I’m
laughing.
She brushed
her
teeth, pulled
on a robe and went
into the kitchen where the table was
already set for breakfast, the coffee ready
to
turn on and an uncut grapefruit waiting on the
counter to be sliced. Preparing everything the night
before was a habit she started
when the
children were
little and Phil had to leave the house at seven a.m. every
morning. It seemed more efficient. Things seemed to take twice as long to do in the morning and, somehow, the habit stuck, even though there was no longer a reason
for
it.
I could sleep until noon and no one would
know
or
care, she thought as she pulled on her
bathing suit, grabbed a towel and went
downstairs for a before breakfast swim, another habit she started when she and Phil moved to Florida.
It still seemed an incredible luxury to
have
a swimming pool, a heated swimming pool, right downstairs and to be able to swim
outside all year. Jenna took full advantage of it.
She swam for a half hour, ate breakfast, checked her email, and the day
stretched in front of
her,
yawningly empty.
Once there
weren’t enough
hours in the day
to
do everything she had
to
do: shopping, rehearsing or auditioning for a play
or
a commercial, calling agents to
remind them that she was available or would be available soon, sending out resumes and head shots, driving Phil to one of his many doctors appointments,
going to luncheons, talking to the
kids
on the phone, going to the beach, trying new restaurants and going to movies or the theater, playing bingo or having pot luck dinners with friends…
“We were
so busy, so happy,” she told
Dr.
Joan, the therapist she started seeing soon after Phil died. “Then, Phil had
that
damn
heart attack and
the diabetes got worse, he had
trouble walking and I became a caregiver. Me! That’s the last
thing I
ever
thought I’d be.
I
mean, I know
the marriage vows say, ‘in
sickness and in health,’ but who ever listens?
We
were in our twenties when we got married. I remember thinking, ‘Yeah, yeah, I do, I do, now let’s
get
on with the dancing and the dinner and the toasts.’ I’m so mad, so mad
at him for dying and leaving me all alone...”
Dr. Joan listened and assured her that
her feelings were natural and normal.
She suggested that Jenna keep a journal to record her feelings. “Writing things down really helps.” She also said
it was important to “keep busy; to get
back
to doing things you like to do.”
“I guess I
could
go visit the kids; they’ve been
asking me, but I’d
have
to make plane reservations and pack and…Okay,
I’ll do it.” So she dutifully went to New York to visit Kara and
Mark and two-year-old
Allison.
”Mom, this is so great! I’ll take time off
from work; we’ll shop till we drop and you can help
us look
for
a house.” Kara
was a guidance counselor, Mark a lawyer; they lived in a bursting at
the
seams one bedroom apartment in Soho and after five days of sleeping on a pull- out
sofa
in the living room, Jenna (and her aching back)
was
more than ready
to
fly to Arizona
to
see her son Tim, his wife Beth and their sons Carter and Hunter who were four and six.
“Such formal names for such little boys,” Phil used to complain. “What happened to
simple names like Joe or Mike or Tom”?
The little
boys
had adored their Grandpa and during
Jenna’s visit, kept looking at her reproachfully and asking questions.
“Where exactly is Grampa?”
“How do you know for sure that he’s dead? Why couldn’t you fix
him?”
“If he’s dead, where
are his clothes?” It almost seemed
to
her that they blamed her for letting him die. Tim and Beth tried hard
to
entertain her; they went
to
restaurants, movies and
they
even found a circus complete with trapeze artists
and cotton candy. Jenna tried
hard to be
enthusiastic about
all their plans, but she couldn’t help
breathing a sigh of relief when
they dropped
her
off at the airport
and
waved good-bye.
“I couldn’t wait
to
come home,” Jenna
told Dr. Joan at her next session. “I love Kara and Tim and the grandkids, but frankly, I don’t
like visiting. It’s exhausting playing games, going
out,
being cheerful, feeling like I’m in
the
way, waiting for them to take me someplace.
I
like
my own home, my own bed. I like
doing what
I want to do when I
want
to
do it.“
Jenna’s friend Natalie, a singer, called
to
tell her about an open audition for a
commercial she just saw in the Actors Association on-line newsletter.
“You’d be perfect
for
the part; it sounds
just like you. You know, Jenna,” as Jenna was explaining how
she
just didn’t
feel up
to
going, “you can’t keep on grieving
for
Phil; he wouldn’t want you to. He’d want you to get out and
do
things. Life goes on Jen, it goes
on.
Come on, I’ll go to the audition with you. We’ll both audition.”
“I can't go today,” Jenna insisted “because, um, because I’m
going to this meeting tonight. I found it
on-line yesterday.”
She turned on the computer and searched for the listing
as she was talking.
“It’s a play reading group; it's pot
luck
and
I already called and
RSVP’d and
said I’d bring
a salad.” She crossed
her
fingers as she said it and actually did RSVP the minute
Natalie hung up.
I’m absolutely
going to go, she said
to
herself. I’m going to go and I’m going to have a good time.
JENNA’S JOURNAL
Dr. Joan said
to keep a journal so
I’ll try it, but really, what for? Who
cares?
How can it help me? She said
to write about my feelings, but really, the only way I feel is mad. Damn, damn mad. How could Phil die?
How could he do this to me? We were so careful, I took
him
to the doctors, made him take his medicine, cooked healthy meals (most of
the
time). He didn’t
smoke or drink (much)
and
he
exercised...well, he swam
everyday and we went for
walks and he
came though
the operation and I didn’t complain (much) about taking
care
of
him. I didn’t even
wake him up when
he snored because he needed
his sleep. So how could
he
go and die right
before our
anniversary? It isn’t fair, it
isn’t fair, it
isn’t fair! I miss
him so much and
he
doesn’t even care
because he’s dead! He’s dead and he’s never,
ever coming back.
