Storybook Ending
A Novel
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
A charming story about friendship, community, and the magic that happens in bookstores—when an anonymous note left in a book finds the wrong recipient.
April, a smart and lonely tech worker, worries work from home has gotten out of hand: She’s left an anonymous note in a book for Westley, the clerk at her Seattle neighborhood bookstore who has a gentle smile and looks great in flannel. But thanks to fate, Laura—a busy single mom who had given up on love—buys the book, finds the note, and thinks Westley has left it for her. A handsome man who loves books seems like just the plot twist she has been looking for.
Meanwhile, Westley—not the most perceptive—is too distracted by the movie filming at the store and the ambition it’s unlocked in him to notice either of the two women. But as April and Laura’s anonymous correspondence continues back and forth, their mundane routines are challenged, sparking a glimmer of hope. Is a happy ending in the cards for them?
A heartwarming web of mistaken identities and serendipitous encounters, Storybook Ending is a playful tribute to friendship, love stories of all kinds, and to the objects—from a forgotten slip of paper to someone’s heart—left between the pages of books we loved.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Seattle Times critic Macdonald debuts with a lively tale of three dissatisfied people linked by a Seattle bookstore. April, single at 33, laments the isolation of working from home for her tech job. She decides to leave a note for her crush in a book at the bookstore where he works, reasoning that "you just have to throw something out into the world and see what happens." Westley, the bookseller, is oblivious to April, and though he loves the store, he feels destined for bigger and better things. During a movie shoot in the store, he throws himself into his role as a background character. In a comedy of errors, 40-ish widowed single mother Laura, a fashion consultant, finds April's note in a book Westley sells her and thinks it's for her, and that he was its author. Neither April nor Laura knows Westley's name, and the trio's continued correspondence yields a series of false starts and humorous twists. Macdonald shades in the details of her protagonists' lives with colorful depictions of their friends and relatives, quirky coworkers, and awkward former lovers. It's a diverting slice of life.
