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Save What's Left cover art

Save What's Left

Written by: Elizabeth Castellano
Narrated by: Thérèse Plummer
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Publisher's Summary

GMA BOOK CLUB PICK • ONE OF PEOPLE MAGAZINE'S BEST BOOKS OF SUMMER • An outrageously funny debut novel about a woman who moves to a small beach town looking for peace, only to find herself in an all-out war with her neighbors.

“Irreverent and unexpectedly tender, this story takes neighborhood feuding to new heights and finds beauty and reinvention in unlikely places."—Oprah Daily

"Brings a tongue-in-cheek tone to the beach read genre."—TIME

When Kathleen Deane’s husband, Tom, tells her he's no longer happy with his life and their marriage, Kathleen is confused. They live in Kansas. They’ve been married thirty years. Who said anything about being happy? But with Tom off finding himself, Kathleen starts to think about what she wants. And her thoughts lead her to a small beach community on the east coast, a town called Whitbey that has always looked lovely in the Christmas letters her childhood friend Josie sends every year.

It turns out, though, that life in Whitbey is nothing like Josie’s letters. Kathleen’s new neighbor, Rosemary, is cantankerous, and the town’s supervisor won't return Kathleen’s emails, but worst of all is the Sugar Cube, the monstrosity masquerading as a holiday home that Kathleen’s absentee neighbors are building next door to her quaint (read: tiny) cottage. As Kathleen gets more and more involved in the fight against the Sugar Cube and town politics overall, she realizes that Whitbey may not be a fairytale, but it just might be exactly what she needed.

Save What’s Left can best be described as the “un-beach read.” It pulls back the curtain on life in a beach town, revealing the true cost of a pretty view. Told from the candid and irreverent perspective of a newcomer turned local, this is a story of forgiveness, fortitude, and second chances.

©2023 Elizabeth Castellano (P)2023 Random House Audio

What the critics say

ONE OF PEOPLE MAGAZINE'S BEST BOOKS OF SUMMER • A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK: Today.com, The Skimm, Southern Living, She Reads, Good Housekeeping

"Irreverent and unexpectedly tender, this story takes neighborhood feuding to new heights and finds beauty and reinvention in unlikely places. A wickedly funny debut." Oprah Daily

"When her marriage goes bust, Kathleen heads for Long Island, where the challenges of owning a beach house—okay, a converted oyster shack—fuel a series of unfortunate, yet absolutely hilarious, events." —People

"With its wisecracking protagonist—Kathleen Deane, still reeling from her husband Tom’s declaration that he was unhappy with their Kansas life and marriage—Save What’s Left brings a tongue-in-cheek tone to the beach read genre." —TIME

What listeners say about Save What's Left

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Not for me

Having Therese Plummer read this certainly helped a lot, but I just could not finish this. The book is all told in the first person, which in all but a very few cases I find very tedious. It’s hard for me to drop my skepticism and fully enter the writer’s world in books written in the first person. There’s very little dialogue, and I’m always asked to understand other characters through the heroine’s descriptions and conclusions. I found that after awhile the first person telling becomes a rant that continues from the opening pages to the end. There are some humorous points here and there, and I think there is some coming to terms with her new life, on the part of the heroine, but after about 50 pp I skipped ahead to the last chapter, but couldn’t finish that either, so I really am not sure about the point of the story.
The book is well read - as always by Therese Plummer - so if you don’t mind first person narratives, you might actually enjoy it. Me? I returned it and got my credit back. Thanks, Audible!

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