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that old cape magic
following bridge of sighs a national best seller hailed by the boston globe as an astounding achievement and a masterpiece richard russo gives us the story of a marriage and of all the other ties that bind from parents and in laws to children and the promises of youth . br griffin has been tooling around for nearly a year with his fathers ashes in the trunk but his mother is very much alive and not shy about calling on his cell phone . she does so as he drives down to cape cod where he and his wife joy will celebrate the marriage of their daughter lauras best friend . for griffin this is akin to driving into the past since he took his childhood summer vacations here his parents respite from the hated midwest . and the cape is where he and joy honeymooned in the course of which they drafted the great truro accord a plan for their lives together thats now thirty years old and has largely come true . hed left screenwriting and los angeles behind for the sort of new england college his snobby academic parents had always aspired to in vain ; theyd moved into an old house full of character ; and theyd started a family . check check and check . br but be careful what you pray for especially if you manage to achieve it . by the end of this perfectly lovely weekend the past has so thoroughly swamped the present that the future suddenly hangs in the balance . and when a year later a far more important wedding takes place their beloved lauras on the coast of maine griffins chauffeuring two urns of ashes as he contends once more with joy and her large unruly family and both he and she have brought dates along . how in the world could this have happened br that old cape magic is a novel of deep introspection and every family feeling imaginable with a middle aged man confronting his parents and their failed marriage his own troubled one his daughters new life and finally what it was he thought he wanted and what in fact he has . the storytelling is flawless throughout moments of great comedy and even hilarity alternating with others of rueful understanding and heart stopping sadness and its ending is at once surprising uplifting and unlike anything this pulitzer prize winner has ever written . p from the hardcover edition .
compact disc random house audible 2009 isbn13 9780739318928 isbn10 0739318926
abridged n isbn 13 9780739318928 number in series 1 publisher random house release date 1249344000000