Chestnut Street

NY: Knopf, 2014. 1st Edition Thus. Hardcover_boards. Collectible - VeryGood/VeryGood. 6"x8.5". 667 pgs. Black boards w/gilt lettering on spine. DJ illustration by William Low; DJ design by Carol Devine Carson. DJ illustration by William Low. Portrait of Maeve Binchy by Maeve McCarthy. DJ #1388842. Spine has crease, binding tight, pages clean and bright. Unmarked. Few soiling spots to inside front and back cover, edges, and backside of DJ. Large Print. Maeve Binchy imagined a street in Dublin with many characters coming and going, and every once in a while she would write about one of these people. She would then put it in a drawer; "for the future," she would say. The future is now.
Across town from St. Jarlath's Crescent, featured in Minding Frankie, is Chestnut Street, where neighbors come and go. Behind their closed doors we encounter very different people with different life circumstances, occupations, and sensibilities. Some of the unforgettable characters lovingly brought to life by Binchy are Bucket Maguire, the window cleaner, who must do more than he bargained for to protect his son; Nessa Byrne, whose aunt visits from America every summer and turns the house—and Nessa's world—upside down; Lilian, the generous girl with the big heart and a fiancé whom no one approves of; Melly, whose gossip about the neighbors helps Madame Magic, a self-styled fortune-teller, get everyone on the right track; Dolly, who discovers more about her perfect mother than she ever wanted to know; and Molly, who learns the cure for sleeplessness from her pen pal from Chicago . . .
Chestnut Street is written with the humor and understanding that are earmarks of Maeve Binchy's extraordinary work and, once again, she warms our hearts with her storytelling. Goodreads 3.67.