Once again Sarah Addison Allen delights me with her tale of a "need Mom's approval" thirty-something daughter living at home while caring for her aging mother. Josey, known all over Bald Slope because of her family's wealth (as well as her own bad behavior as a child), has been totally dissatisfied with her life but not until crazy Della Lee moves into her closet does she begin to wish for more. Della believes she has landed there to assist Josie in pulling away from home, thinking for herself, and pursuing the secret love of her life.
Josie does begin to do those very things as the story unfolds. She steps out of her routine, makes new friends and finally believes she can be lovable...although her mother has indicated the opposite all of her life. Along the way Josie begins to understand some of her mother's angst and her dead father's weaknesses. The magical elements which have made Allen's work so charming are intact: moving books with exactly the right content found on tables or car seats, and plucky characters with slightly "psychic" or paranormal tendencies (like when the water automatically boils in the kettle whenever the man Chloe loves walks into the room where she is).
I'm sure there may be other readers who hunger only for realism, but Allen's whimsy continues to make me smile.
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