Sullivan’s clever writing makes this pick the perfect summer read-delicious and compelling through the last word. USA Today Sullivan pulls off the difficult task of creating distinctive voices for characters spread across the past sixty years. What follows is the formation of an unlikely friendship that changes the course of the two women’s lives.įriends and Strangers ultimately reveals that happiness comes from authenticity and purpose, rather than wealth, success, or secrets. Sullivan’s intimate, incisive latest (after Saints for all Occasions) explores the evolving friendship between a new mother and her babysitter. Sullivan’s admiration and affection for Gerety, and sensitivity to the challenges she faced, make for entertaining and touching passages. Race plays a smaller part in her story, but Sullivan is just as interested in. Lonely, exhausted, and unable to find time to focus on her next book, Elisabeth hires a part-time nanny, Sam. Courtney Sullivan approaches that terrain from a different angle in her new novel, Friends and Strangers.
But when she and her family move from Brooklyn to her husband’s hometown in upstate New York, her well-maintained façade cracks. She has a beautiful baby, a loving husband, and a three-book publishing deal. It’s a compelling book that takes on modern issues surrounding adulthood, motherhood, and class.įrom the outside, Elisabeth seems to have it all. Although it’s disguised as a small book, lacking a big concept, I was riveted by the intimacy Sullivan presents in the lives. Courtney Sullivan successfully peels away the layers of domestic bonds, motherhood, friendship, class, and privilege. Told through the alternating perspectives of two women, the novel presents two coming-of-age stories: one of a young mother and another of her college-aged nanny. A new mom moves to a small town and discovers who she is all over again.
Friends and Strangers is a book about living an authentic, fulfilling life.
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