Hedge A novel

The romance that arrives in the life of a woman moving on from her marriage turns out to be more of a problematic beginning than a happy ending. Maud, a 40-year-old garden historian in San Francisco, has had enough of her pretense of a marriage to Peter, which also denied her the opportunity to follow her career. Now, spending the summer working on the restoration of a formal Victorian garden in New York's Hudson Valley, and separated from her husband, she finds herself falling for Gabriel, an archaeologist who's attached to the same project. But Maud's two daughters have arrived to join her for two months and need her attention, especially sensitive, moody 13-year-old Ella, who seems jealous of Maud and is flirting with Gabriel. The tension among the group reaches a crisis point as Peter comes to visit and Ella disappears, leading to revelations that will require Maud to stay married and put her children's needs first. Back in San Francisco, trying to make things work with Peter and assist Ella on her long road to recovery, Maud finds a new, local restoration job involving the garden of Hispanic settlers and looks back with a critical eye on "the collateral damage of that heedless summer." Then she meets Alice Lincoln, a wealthy artist who might underwrite the current garden project, and they become friends, distracting Maud from her musings about Gabriel, sex, and a life free from compromise. But the association with Alice leads unexpectedly to further ruptures that will blow Maud's life open even more drastically. Delury's sharply drawn portrait of anguish, loneliness, fear, and desire is less innovative and more slender than her noted debut, The Balcony (2018). But dodging romantic predictability while acknowledging the heart's true priorities, it delivers an engaging new journey from ignorance to knowledge via a garden. A persuasive, quietly satisfying portrait of a woman's midlife crisis and the essential choices she makes. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.