Guido and Vincent are childhood best friends--third cousins, really--living in Cambridge and dreaming about their futures. Guido plans to write poetry while Vincent feels confident he will win a Nobel prize for physics. When Guido spots Holly while exiting a museum, he can immediately sense that she will difficult, quirky, and hard to live with. He loves her on sight. Vincent, open-minded and cheerful, meets Misty at work. Though she is a bored and...

When Sam Bax, that charming daredevil of a Boston lawyer, sails his boat into a storm off the coast of Maine, Elizabeth "Olly" Bax, his wife and ardent sidekick, becomes a widow at the edge of seventy-seven. With no pretense of "courage," Olly grieves, coping with the warmth and awkwardness of family ties and trying to rethink her own life. Realizing that her risks are as daring as any of Sam's -- while he chanced life and limb, Olly risks her heart -- she finds that love can take some surprising turns.

Laurie Colwin depics Olly's recovery with humor, compassion, and a decided lack...