Out of Love by Hilma Wolitzer (Excerpt)

After her parents’ divorce, Teddy realizes that love is not as easy as it looks.

In Teddy’s daydreams, the elevator is never broken and her father comes home every day. But in reality, her dad has a new home and a new wife, Shelley, who is glamorous in a way Teddy’s mother could never be. Still, Teddy holds out hope that one day her dad will come to his senses—and when she finds a shoebox full of faded love letters in the closet, she knows her mother is hoping for the same thing. In the letters, her father calls her mother “my own true love.”

If Teddy can just fix her mom up a little bit, maybe her dad will realize he loves her still. But after exercise classes, a visit from the Avon lady, and a furious campaign to get her mom to stop smoking, Teddy learns that real love is far more complex than those old letters make it seem. And though her parents love and support her, Teddy’s perceptions of her family will have to change.