Search results for ""Author Leesa Cross-Smith""

On a rainy October night in Kentucky, recently divorced therapist Tallie Clark is on her way home from work when she spots a man precariously standing at the edge of a bridge. Without a second thought, Tallie pulls over and jumps out of the car into the pouring rain. She convinces the man to join her for a cup of coffee, and he eventually agrees to come back to her house, where he finally shares his name: Emmett. Over the course of the emotionally charged weekend that follows, Tallie makes it her mission to provide a safe space for Emmett, though she hesitates to confess that this is also her day job. What she doesn't realize is that Emmett isn't the only one who needs healing-and they both are harboring secrets.Alternating between Tallie and Emmett's perspectives as they inch closer to the truth of what brought Emmett to the bridge's edge-as well as the hard truths Tallie has been grappling with since her marriage ended-This Close to Okay is an uplifting, cathartic story about chance encounters, hope found in unlikely moments, and the subtle magic of human connection.Book of the Month December PickGood Housekeeping Book Club February PickMarie Claire Book Club March PickLonglisted for the Goodreads Choice AwardsMost Anticipated by Elle, Today (according to Goodreads), The Millions, She Reads, and Real SimpleRecommended by Refinery29, Shondaland, Oprah Daily, Washington Post, Glamour, Cosmopolitan, Electric Literature, Bookriot, Parade, Harper's Bazaar, and more

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''This Close to Okay hits the ground running. Cross-Smith writes tenderly about the trial and error of intimacy and draws you in with enormous warmth and control'' - Raven Leilani, author of LUSTEROn a rainy October night, therapist Tallie Clark is on her way home from work when she spots a man standing at the edge of a bridge. Without a second thought, Tallie pulls over and convinces him to join her for a cup of coffee. Eventually, he agrees to come back to her house, where he finally shares his name: Emmett.Over the course of the emotionally charged weekend that follows, Tallie makes it her mission to provide a safe space for Emmett. But he isn''t the only one who needs healing-and they both are harbouring secrets...As they inch closer to the truth of what brought Emmett to the bridge-and the hard truths Tallie has been grappling with since her marriage ended-could their connection lead to love?This Close to Okay is an uplif

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From Kentucky to the California desert, these forty-two short stories expose the glossy and matte hearts of girls and women in moments of obsessive desire and fantasy, wildness and bad behaviour, brokenness and fearlessness and more. Teenage girls sneak out on a summer night to meet their boyfriends by the train tracks. A woman escapes suffocating grief through a vivid fantasy life. Members of a cult form an unsettling chorus as they extol their passion for the same man. A love story begins over cabbages in a grocery store. A laundress' life is consumed by obsession for a famous baseball player. Two high school friends kiss all night and binge-watch Winona Ryder movies after the death of a sister.Leesa Cross-Smith's sensuous stories will drench readers in nostalgia for summer nights and sultry days, the intense friendships of teenage girls and the innate bonds felt between women. She evokes the pangs of loss and motherhood, the headiness and destructive potential of desire and the pure exhilaration of being female. The stories in So We Can Glow-some long, some gone in a flash, some told over text and emails-take the wild hearts of girls and women and hold them up so they can catch the light.

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Vincent, having grown up as the privileged daughter of artists, has a lovely life in many ways. At forty-four, she enjoys strolling the streets of Paris and teaching at the modern art museum; she has a vibrant group of friends; and she's even caught the eye of a young, charismatic man named Loup. But Vincent is also in Paris to escape a painful betrayal: her husband, Cillian, has published a bestselling book divulging secrets about their marriage and his own past, hinting that when he was a teenager, he may have had a child with a young woman back in Dublin-before he moved to California and never returned.Now estranged from her husband, Vincent has agreed to see Cillian again at their son's wedding the following summer, but Loup introduces new complications. Soon they begin an intense affair, and somewhere between dinners made together, cigarettes smoked in the moonlight, hazy evenings in nightclubs, and long, starry walks along the Seine, Vincent feels herself loosening and blossoming.In a journey that is both transportive and intimate, Half-Blown Rose traverses Paris, art, travel, liminal spaces, and the messy complexities of relationships and romance, with excerpts from Cillian's novel, playlists, and journal entries woven throughout. As Cillian does all he can to win her back, Vincent must decide what she wants . . . and who she will be.

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''Sharp-edged and sexy, Half-Blown Rose is an utterly intoxicating story of love, betrayal, and loyalty'' Taylor Jenkins ReidAfter learning a shocking truth about her husband''s past, forty-four-year-old Vincent Wilde moves to Paris determined to build a new life. She''s soon teaching modern art and enjoying a vibrant group of friends-but when she meets a charismatic young man named Loup, her life in the city becomes more thrilling than she''d ever imagined. Somewhere between dinners made together, cigarettes smoked in the moonlight, sexy evenings in nightclubs and long romantic walks along the Seine, Vincent feels herself blossoming.However, as her affair with Loup intensifies, she begins to wonder about their age difference-a hurdle that''s heightened by the fact she''s due to see her estranged husband Cillian again at their son''s wedding in the summer...An irresistibly romantic story of a woman remaking her life on her own terms, shot thr

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O, The Oprah Magazine's Best Books of the SummerLonglisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel PrizeSet in contemporary Louisville, Leesa Cross-Smith’s mesmerizing first novel surrounding the death of a police officer is a requiem for marriage, friendship and family, from an author Roxane Gay has called “a consummate storyteller.”One of the Most Anticipated Books of 2018: Entertainment Weekly, Southern Living, Harper's BAZAAR, The Millions, Electric Lit, Book Riot, BookBub, Chicago Review of Books, POPSUGAR, Refinery29, NYLON, and SheReadsEvi—a classically-trained ballerina—was nine months pregnant when her husband Eamon was killed in the line of duty on a steamy morning in July. Now, it is winter, and Eamon's adopted brother Dalton has moved in to help her raise six-month-old Noah.Whiskey & Ribbons is told in three intertwining, melodic voices: Evi in present day, as she’s snowed in with Dalton during a freak blizzard; Eamon before his murder, as he prepares for impending fatherhood and grapples with the danger of his profession; and Dalton, as he struggles to make sense of his life next to Eamon’s, and as he decides to track down the biological father he’s never known.In the vein of Jojo Moyes’ After You, Whiskey & Ribbons explores the life that continues beyond loss, with a complicated brotherly dynamic reminiscent of Elizabeth Strout’s The Burgess Boys. It’s a meditation on grief, hope, motherhood, brotherhood and surrogate fatherhood. Above all, it’s a novel about what it means—and whether it’s possible—to heal.

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An irresistible story of a woman remaking her life after her husband’s betrayal leads to a year of travel, art, and passion in Paris, from the award-winning author of This Close to Okay.   Vincent, having grown up as the privileged daughter of artists, has a lovely life in many ways. At forty-four, she enjoys strolling the streets of Paris and teaching at the modern art museum; she has a vibrant group of friends; and she’s even caught the eye of a young, charismatic man named Loup. But Vincent is also in Paris to escape a painful betrayal: her husband, Cillian, has published a bestselling book divulging secrets about their marriage and his own past, hinting that when he was a teenager, he may have had a child with a young woman back in Dublin—before he moved to California and never returned.   Now estranged from her husband, Vincent has agreed to see Cillian again at their son’s wedding the following summer, but Lo

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