Best Staged Plans

By Claire Cook
(Voice, Paperback, 9781401341855, 256pp.)

Publication Date: April 2012

Other Editions of This Title: Hardcover, Hardcover, Compact Disc, Compact Disc, MP3 CD, MP3 CD, Compact Disc

Categories: Humorous, Contemporary Women, Family Life

Selected by Indie Booksellers for the June 2011 Indie Next List

“Best Staged Plans is a classic Cook romp featuring Sandy, a home stager who could only wish that her talent for making other people's lives appear organized and appealing could extend to her own life, which is rife with chaos on every level. The novel is full of trademark Cook wit and wry observations on those everyday situations that would be really comical if only they were happening to someone else. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll tell all your girlfriends that this is the beach read of the summer!”

-- Jill Miner, Saturn Booksellers, Gaylord, MI

Description

"Claire Cook's characters aren't rich or glamorous--they're physically imperfect, emotionally insecure, and deeply familiar."
--Tom Perrotta, author of Little Children

"If I had a sister, I'd want her to be Claire Cook . . . Claire Cook is wicked good."
--Jacquelyn Mitchard, author of The Deep End of the Ocean

"Reading Claire Cook might be the most fun you have all summer."
--Elin Hilderbrand, author of The Castaways

"Claire Cook has an original voice, sparkling style, and a window into family life that will make you laugh and cry."
--Adriana Trigiani, author of Big Stone Gap

"Charming, engagingly quirky, and full of fun, Claire Cook just gets it."
--Meg Cabot, author of The Princess Diaries

As a professional home stager, Sandy Sullivan is an expert at transforming cluttered rooms into attractive houses ready for sale. If only reinventing her life were as easy as choosing the perfect paint color. She's eager to put her family's suburban Boston home on the market, to downsize, and to simplify her own life. But she must first deal with her foot-dragging husband and her grown son, who has moved back home after college to inhabit the basement "bat cave."

After reading them the riot act, Sandy takes a job staging a boutique hotel in Atlanta recently acquired by her best friend's boyfriend. The good news is that she can spend time with her recently married daughter, Shannon, in Atlanta. The bad news is that Shannon finds herself heading to Boston for job training, leaving Sandy and her southern son-in-law, Chance, as reluctant roommates. If that's not complicated enough, Sandy begins to suspect that her best friend's boyfriend may be seeing another woman on the side.

Filled with characters who are fresh and original, yet recognizable enough to live in your neighborhood--plus plenty of great tips and tricks for fixing up houses, and lives--this is a wise and witty story of letting go and moving on. Best Staged Plans is Claire Cook at her most humorous and heartfelt.

About the Author

Claire Cook is the best-selling author of the novels The Wildwater Walking Club, Summer Blowout, Life's A Beach, Must Love Dogs, Ready to Fall, and Multiple Choice. Formerly a teacher of physical fitness and creative writing, she has also had stints as a copywriter, radio continuity director, garden designer, dance and aerobics choreographer. She lives in Scituate, Massachusetts, often called the Irish Riviera, with her family.

This book is on these lists:

Tornadotoni's Wish List by tornadotoni
Atsamom's Wish List by atsamom
Missydiane's Wish List by missydiane

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