Enormous Wings - by Laurie Frankel (Hardcover)

About the Book

"From the beloved New York Times bestselling author Laurie Frankel, an exuberant and timely new novel At seventy-seven, Pepper Mills is too old to be a stranger in a strange land. She didn't choose the Vista View Retirement Community of Austin, Texas-that would be her three grown children-but when she grudgingly moves in, she not only makes new friends, she falls in love. Then the exhaustion, vomiting, and confusion start. Her children and grandchildren worry it's cancer, dementia, a stroke. But a raft of tests later, the news is even more shocking: she's pregnant. Once word gets out, everyone wants a piece of her: the press and the paparazzi, activists and medical researchers, all descending on Vista View as Pepper tries to determine her next move. Soon Pepper has some hard decisions to make-and some she's not allowed to make. Enormous Wings is an urgent novel about female agency and bodily autonomy, morality and mortality. It's about what happens when you don't get to choose. It's about motherhood and family, sex and love and friendship, and how those bedrocks-even so late in the day-can still change, and then change everything"-- Provided by publisher.

Book Synopsis

From the beloved New York Times bestselling author Laurie Frankel, an exuberant and timely new novel

At seventy-seven, Pepper Mills is too old to be a stranger in a strange land. She didn't choose the Vista View Retirement Community of Austin, Texas--that would be her three grown children--but when she grudgingly moves in, she not only makes new friends, she falls in love. Then the exhaustion, vomiting, and confusion start. She fears it's cancer, dementia, a stroke. But a raft of tests later, the news is even more shocking: She's pregnant.

As word gets out, everyone wants a piece of her: the press and paparazzi, activists and medical researchers, belly-rubbers and rubber-neckers all descending on Vista View while Pepper struggles to determine her next move. Soon she has some hard decisions to make--and some she's not allowed to make.

Enormous Wings is an urgent novel about female agency and bodily autonomy, morality and mortality. It's about what happens when you don't get to choose anymore. It's about motherhood and family, sex and love and friendship, and how those bedrocks--even so late in the day--can still change, and then change everything.

Review Quotes

Praise for Enormous Wings

"Enormous Wings is a brilliant, hilarious, dynamic, and all-consuming story of freedom, choice, aging, and the lengths we will go to for ourselves and our families. Laurie Frankel has written a masterpiece of humanity with just the right dash of weirdness. This is the ultimate interrogation of abortion access in a red state set in the most unexpected place: a senior living community. I am obsessed, moved, and utterly awed."
--Leila Mottley, New York Times bestselling author of Nightcrawling and The Girls Who Grew Big

"Laurie Frankel is one of the best novelists working today. Her new novel, Enormous Wings, is a funny and humane testament to the miracle of love, family, and being alive in the world."
--Lauren Grodstein, author of A Dog in Georgia and We Must Not Think of Ourselves

"Enormous Wings is miraculous--and enormous--in more ways than one. It's a novel of profound strength and compassion and levity and power, extraordinary in its premise, its storytelling, and its willingness to stand for something. The rare novel that is unabashedly political, gloriously entertaining, and deeply humane. A vital novel for our time."
--Nina LaCour, bestselling author of Yerba Buena and Meet Me in the Garden

Praise for Laurie Frankel

"Frankel is a first-rate storyteller; her prose style is witty, thoughtful, and warm."
--The Seattle Times

"Frankel is brilliant at addressing social issues...with witty writing; serious messages are slipped within the pervasive humor."
--The Denver Post

"The full and simple pleasures of Frankel's luscious prose lull the reader into rooting for...these plucky heroines."
--The New York Times

About the Author

Laurie Frankel is the New York Times bestselling, award-winning author of the novels Family Family, One Two Three, Goodbye for Now, The Atlas of Love, and the Reese's Book Club Pick This Is How It Always Is. Frankel lives in Seattle with her husband, daughter, and border collie.