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Esme Cahill Fails Spectacularly
Esme Cahill Fails Spectacularly: A Novel | Marie Bostwick
4 posts | 3 read | 1 to read
From the author of The Restoration of Celia Fairchild, comes a novel about the meaning of family and the places we call home. If you love southern summer fiction authors like Mary Alice Monroe and Kristy Woodson Harvey youll love this delicious novel about family, friendship, and finding your true path in life. Esme Cahill thinks she has failed spectacularly: fired from her New York City publishing job, divorced from her husband, and possessing little more than a broken-down car and a pile of unfinished manuscripts, she drives home to Asheville at the request of her late grandmother, Adele, who had begged her, just before she died, to return to the place she grew up. There she discovers the once-charming lakeside retreat run by her family is sliding toward financial ruin, so with the help of her grandfather, George; estranged mother, Robyn; and a travelling chef Dawes (maker of the worlds best grilled cheese sandwich) they set to work. In the attic, Esme unearths a trove of museum-worthy art quilts, sewn by Adele. Piecing together the inspiration behind them, Esme discovers a forgotten chapter in her family history and her grandmothers untold story, that of a gifted artist who never received her due. This is an always-emotional, sometimes humorous, very human novel of what it means to be familythe ties that bind us together and the unintentional hurts that can rend us apart. And, along the way, Esme learns that failure can be the first step toward the life youre meant to find.
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angieinwonderland
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Pickpick

My only regret I have about reading this book is the timing. Had I known it was set in Asheville where I will be in two weeks, I would have waited till then, but by the time I found out, I was already too deep. I love it when characters find their true selves and new path. Reinvention is my new favorite trope.

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Reecaspieces
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Mehso-so

My review is up. I gave this three stars because if I put the book down for any length of time, I didn‘t care whether I picked it back up or not.

https://reecaspieces.com/2023/06/02/esme-cahill-fails-spectacularly-by-marie-bos...

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robinb
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Mehso-so

Esme Cahill is living the dream she had so carefully mapped out in the publishing industry in NYC…until she‘s fired, disrupting all of her carefully laid plans. She returns home to Asheville, NC at the request of her deceased grandmother Adele, to the lakeside retreat family business and her grandfather and estranged mother. Sadly, the refuge she called home with her grandparents is now run down and losing money. Together with her mother, her 🔽

robinb grandfather George and an adventurous chef named Dawes, they work to bring the retreat back to its glory days. While doing so, Esme learns more about her grandmother‘s past through her unusual handmade quilts found in an attic and begins to write her fascinating story. As the retreat begins a new resurgence and Esme‘s writing does as well, will she return to NYC and the literary world she loves, or will she remain with her roots 🔽 11mo
robinb in NC surrounded by the friends and family who love and support her dreams? I enjoyed this one for the most part. The chapters alternate between Esme‘s life and her grandmother Adele‘s in the 1940s. I found the Adele chapters fascinating in parts especially relating to the Biltmore Estate. But while the storyline was fine, I had some difficulty connecting with the characters themselves at times. I didn‘t feel the depth that I would have liked 🔽 11mo
robinb with Esme, and there is a whole surprising development with the chef Dawes at the end that really threw me off balance. And once things began wrapping up, it all felt a bit too neatly tied up with a bow. All-in-all, well written and interesting but with some depth issues for me. 3.5/5⭐️ 11mo
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