Yorktide, Maine

At first glance, Nell King's cozy home in Yorktide, Maine, seems a step down from the impeccably decorated Boston house she shared with her husband. But in the six years since he abruptly left to marry another woman, Nell and her almost-grown daughters have found real happiness and comfort here. Twenty-one-year-old Molly has never forgiven her father for walking out, though she worries about sacrificing her independence the way her mother did. Should she stay in Maine with her dependable boyfriend, or move to the city and prove herself? Felicity, meanwhile, is torn between loyalty to Nell and wanting to spend time with her glamorous, ski champion stepmother. Nell is eager to cement the bond with her daughters by making this holiday picture-perfect. But there's a complication-and an opportunity . . . Nell's first and greatest love, now a successful novelist, has arrived in town for a book signing. As the two rekindle their friendship, Nell confronts the choices and compromises she once made in the name of stability. And as the coming days unfold with revelations and unexpected gifts, this Christmas promises to herald a bright new beginning.

Every June, the quiet beach town of Ogunquit is overtaken by wealthy families who hire local young women like Amy Latimer and Hayley Franklin to care for their children. Best friends since childhood, Amy and Hayley are eager to secure lucrative summer jobs. Amy wants to finance her upcoming move to Boston. Hayley hopes to squirrel away enough money so that her mom can finally leave her abusive husband. Amy is immediately in thrall to her dynamic boss, Cressida Prior, so different from Amy's mother, Leda. Though skilled at creating tapestries and rugs, Leda lacks confidence. But one thing she does know, after a painful summer long ago as a nanny herself, is how damaging a manipulative boss can be. Hayley's employers, Jon and Marisa Whitby, are loving parents to their two-year-old twins. Jon also has a grown son by a previous marriage. Ethan is kind, handsome, and not least, wealthy. For the first time, Hayley, usually so selfless, can't help seeing him as an opportunity. But the passing weeks bring complications and revelations, altering friendships, testing the bond between mothers and daughters, and proving that the ripples from a single season can last forever . . .

Against the picturesque coastal Maine setting that she evokes so well, bestselling author Holly Chamberlin creates a heartfelt story of family bonds and new beginnings . . . It came as no surprise to anyone in Yorktide when glamorous Carol Ascher fled the little Maine town for New York City. While Carol found success as an interior designer, her younger sister, Bonnie, stayed behind, embracing marriage and motherhood. She even agreed to take in Carol's teenage daughter during a tumultuous patch. Now both their girls are grown and Bonnie, recently widowed, is anticipating the day she'll retire to Ferndean House, the nineteenth-century family home on the rocky Maine coast. But forty-five years after leaving Yorktide, Carol suddenly announces that she's moving back-into Ferndean. Bonnie is indignant. She's the one who kept the homestead in order and tended to their dying mother. Now Carol expects to simply buy her out? As far as Bonnie is concerned, Ferndean is part of their heritage-not just another of Carol's improvement projects, to be torn apart and remade according to her whim. The entire Ascher family is in flux, uncovering secrets that upend their relationships. Carol's longing to be welcomed home is fueled by a painful truth she's carried for years. It will take an extraordinary summer-in a remarkable place-to lead these women back to each other, buoyed by the tides of friendship and forgiveness.

A picturesque Maine beach town is the setting for Holly Chamberlin’s touching and thought-provoking new novel, as a mother struggles to reconnect with her long lost daughter Every year on March 26th, Verity Peterson visits Ogunquit Beach, where she puts a handwritten message into a bottle and launches it into the waves. It’s a ritual of remembrance for the daughter she hasn’t seen in sixteen years not since her baby’s father, Alan, took two-month-old Gemma and disappeared. Verity keeps searching and hoping, sustained by the thought that someday she might get to be a mother to her own child. And finally, one phone call may change everything Verity learns that Alan is now in jail on abduction charges and Marni Armstrong, born Gemma Peterson-Burns, is coming to live with Verity in Yorktide, Maine. But this isn’t the joyful reunion Verity imagined. Gemma has been raised to believe Verity was an unfit mother who left Alan no choice but to take her out of harms way. Over the course of one summer, Verity tries to reach a tough, wary young woman who’s more stranger than daughter. And Gemma must reexamine everything she thought about her parents and decide whether to trust in a relationship that, though delicate as a seashell on the surface, could prove to be just as beautiful and resilient