Heat Wave : A Novel

Lyrical, emotional, dramatic, and packed with Nancy Thayer’s trademark warmth and wisdom, Heat Wave tells the moving story of a woman who, after her seemingly perfect life unravels, must find the strength to live and love again. After her husband’s sudden death, Carley Winsted is determined to keep her two daughters in their beloved home on Nantucket. To ease the family’s financial strain, she decides to transform their grand, historic house into a bed-and-breakfast. Not everyone, however, thinks this plan prudent or quite respectable—especially not Carley’s mother-in-law. Further complicating a myriad of challenges, a friend forces Carley to keep a secret that, if revealed, will undo families and friendships. And her late husband’s former law partner is making Carley confront an array of mixed feelings. Then, during a late-summer heat wave, the lives of Carley and her friends and family will be forever changed in entirely unexpected ways. Unerringly perceptive, superbly written, every page packed with the warmth and compassionate wisdom that have become Nancy Thayer’s trademark, \*Heat Wave\* tells the moving story of a woman who, after her seemingly perfect life unravels, must find the strength to live and love again.Making the startling discovery that her family finances are in dire straits is only the latest shock endured by Carley Winsted after her husband’s sudden death from a heart attack. Resisting her in-laws’ well-meaning overtures to take in Carley and her two daughters, the young widow instead devises a plan to keep her family in their beloved home, a grand historic house on the island of Nantucket. After her husband's sudden death from a heart attack and to keep her family in their beloved Nantucket home, Carley Winsted transforms her expensive, expansive house into a bed-and-breakfast. But complications arise: Carley's mother-in-law disapproves; a friend forces Carley to keep a secret that, if revealed, will undo families and friendships; and, her late husband's former law partner keeps showing up at the most unexpected times. After her husband's sudden death from a heart attack, Carley finds herself in a difficult financial situation and decides to turn their historic Nantucket house into a bed-and-breakfast, but events during a late summer heat wave change the lives of Carley and her family.