The Emergency Book Club: A Novel

Summary

A heartfelt "coming of middle-age" novel about the amazing redemptive power of books, chosen family, and finding meaning in all of life's messiness.

Single mother and freelance copyeditor Annie Crane juggles the sandwich-generation chaos of raising her daughter, Lyddie, on the Upper West Side and staying present for her elderly mother and ailing father in Massachusetts while also trying to stay afloat financially. Maybe she'd like to have a boyfriend too…if she can find the time. But for every moment when she feels stretched too thin, there is the Emergency Book Club.

Annie’s Emergency Book Club (the AEBC, their group chat calls it) consists of Annie and her longtime friends Meg and Hope. When the going gets tough, the women pick a book and read it together as a form of cheap group therapy. The first AEBC was convened during a particularly stressful weekend in college, when Little Women was trotted out as a comfort read. As Annie, Hope, and Meg confront a slew of midlife challenges: the bittersweet reality of caring for aging parents, the heartbreak of infertility, and the perils of over-40 dating, books—and the joy of reading them together—become more of a lifeline than ever.

The Emergency Book Club dives deep into the emotional highs and lows of modern womanhood, celebrating the healing power of books and female friendship as women take on life’s unexpected twists and turns.