The New York Times bestseller about a family in crisis and a friendship pushed to the breaking point: two women forced to confront the limits, and the power, of their lifelong bond.
Liz and Sarabeth were childhood neighbors in the suburbs of northern California, brought as close as sisters by the suicide of Sarabeth’s mother when the girls were just sixteen. In the decades that followed—through Liz’s marriage and the birth of her children, through Sarabeth’s attempts to make a happy life for herself despite the shadow cast by her mother’s act—their relationship remained a source of continuity and strength. But when Liz’s adolescent daughter enters dangerous waters that threaten to engulf the family, the fault lines in the women’s friendship are revealed, and Liz and Sarabeth are forced to reexamine their most deeply held beliefs about their connection.
Songs Without Words is about the sometimes confining roles we take on in our closest relationships, about the familial myths that shape us, and about the limits—and the power—of the friendships we create when we are young. Here is a novel of singular force and complexity: thoughtful, moving, and absolutely gripping.