{"product_id":"between-sisters-isbn-9780345519467","title":"Between Sisters","description":"\u003cb\u003e#1 \u003ci\u003eNEW YORK TIMES \u003c\/i\u003eBESTSELLER • The renowned author of \u003ci\u003eThe Women \u003c\/i\u003evividly explores the intricate bonds of sisterhood and family.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“[Kristin] Hannah [brings] snap and a lot of warmth to a familiar lesson: that contentment comes from accepting each other’s flaws.”—\u003ci\u003ePeople\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYears ago, Meghann Dontess made a terrible choice that cost her everything, including the love of her sister, Claire. Now, Meghann is a highly successful attorney who doesn’t believe in intimacy—until she meets the one man who can change her mind. Claire Cavenaugh has fallen in love for the first time in her life. As her wedding day approaches, she prepares to face her strong-willed older sister. Reunited after more than two decades apart, these two women who believe they have nothing in common will try to become what they never were: a family. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTender, funny, bittersweet, and moving, \u003ci\u003eBetween Sisters\u003c\/i\u003e skillfully explores the profound joys and sorrows shared by sisters, the mistakes made in the name of love, and the promise of redemption—all beautifully told by acclaimed author Kristin Hannah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e“Enormously entertaining . . . Hannah has a nice ear for dialogue and a knack for getting the reader inside the characters’ heads.”—\u003ci\u003eThe Seattle Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e“Hannah writes of love with compassion and conviction.”—Luanne Rice\u003c\/b\u003e“Hannah is superb at delving into her main characters’ psyches and delineating nuances  of feeling.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eWashington Post Book World\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eKristin Hannah \u003c\/b\u003eis the #1 \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestselling author of many acclaimed novels, including \u003ci\u003eThe Great Alone, The Nightingale, \u003c\/i\u003eand\u003ci\u003e Magic Hour\u003c\/i\u003e. She and her husband live in the Pacific Northwest.CHAPTER ONE\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Dr. Bloom waited patiently for an answer.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Meghann Dontess leaned back  in her seat and studied her fingernails. It was time for a manicure. Past time. \"I  try not to feel too much, Harriet. You know that. I find it impedes my enjoyment  of life.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Is that why you've seen me every week for four years? Because you enjoy  your life so much?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"I wouldn't point that out if I were you. It doesn't say much  for your psychiatric skills. It's entirely possible, you know, that I was perfectly  normal when I met you and you're actually making me crazy.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"You're using humor  as a shield again.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"You're giving me too much credit. That wasn't funny.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Harriet  didn't smile. \"I rarely think you're funny.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"There goes my dream of doing stand-up.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Let's talk about the day you and Claire were separated.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Meghann shifted uncomfortably  in her seat. Just when she needed a smart-ass response, her mind went blank. She  knew what Harriet was poking around for, and Harriet knew she knew. If Meghann didn't  answer, the question would simply be asked again. \"Separated. A nice, clean word.  Detached. I like it, but that subject is closed.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"It's interesting that you maintain  a relationship with your mother while distancing yourself from your sister.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Meghann  shrugged. \"Mama's an actress. I'm a lawyer. We're comfortable with make-believe.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Meaning?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Have you ever read one of her interviews?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"No.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"She tells everyone  that we lived this poor, pathetic-but-loving existence. We pretend it's the truth.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"You were living in Bakersfield when the pathetic-but-loving pretense ended, right?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Meghann remained silent. Harriet had maneuvered her back to the painful subject  like a rat through a maze.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Harriet went on, \"Claire was nine years old. She was  missing several teeth, if I remember correctly, and she was having difficulties with  math.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Don't,\" Meghann curled her fingers around the chair's sleek wooden arms.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Harriet stared at her. Beneath the unruly black ledge of her eyebrows, her gaze  was steady. Small round glasses magnified her eyes. \"Don't back away, Meg. We're  making progress.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Any more progress and I'll need an aid car. We should talk about  my practice. That's why I come to you, you know. It's a pressure cooker down in Family  Court these days. Yesterday, I had a deadbeat dad drive up in a Ferrari and then  swear he was flat broke. The shithead. Didn't want to pay for his daughter's tuition.  Too bad for him I videotaped his arrival.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Why do you keep paying me if you don't  want to discuss the root of your problems?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"I have issues, not problems. And there's  no point in poking around in the past. I was sixteen when all that happened. Now,  I'm a whopping forty-two. It's time to move on. I did the right thing. It doesn't  matter anymore.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Then why do you still have the nightmare?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e She fiddled with the  silver David Yurman bracelet on her wrist. \"I have nightmares about spiders who wear  Oakley sunglasses, too. But you never ask about that. Oh, and last week, I dreamed  I was trapped in a glass room that had a floor made of bacon. I could hear people  crying, but I couldn't find the key. You want to talk about that one?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"A feeling  of isolation. An awareness that people are upset by your actions, or missing you.  Okay, let's talk about that dream. Who is crying?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Shit.\" Meghann should have seen  that. After all, she had an undergraduate degree in psychology. Not to mention the  fact that she'd once been called a child prodigy.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e She glanced down at her platinum  and gold watch. \"Too bad, Harriet. Time's up. I guess we'll have to solve my pesky  neuroses next week.\" She stood up, smoothed the pant legs of her navy Armani suit.  Not that there was a wrinkle to be found.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Harriet slowly removed her glasses.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Meghann  crossed her arms in an instinctive gesture of self-protection. \"This should be good.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Do you like your life, Meghann?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e That wasn't what she'd expected. \"What's not  to like? I'm the best divorce attorney in the state. I live--\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"--alone--\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"--in  a kick-ass condo above the Public Market and drive a brand-new Porsche.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Friends?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"I talk to Elizabeth every Thursday night.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Family?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Maybe it was time to get  a new therapist. Harriet had ferreted out all of Meghann's weak points. \"My mom stayed  with me for a week last year. If I'm lucky, she'll come back for another visit just  in time to watch the colonization of Mars on MTV.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"And Claire?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"My sister and  I have problems, I'll admit it. But nothing major. We're just too busy to get together.\"  When Harriet didn't speak, Meghann rushed in to fill the silence. \"Okay, she makes  me crazy, the way she's throwing her life away. She's smart enough to do anything,  but she stays tied to that loser campground they call a resort.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"With her father.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"I don't want to discuss my sister. And I definitely don't want to discuss her father.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Harriet tapped her pen on the table. \"Okay, how about this: When was the last time  you slept with the same man twice?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"You're the only one who thinks that's a bad  thing. I like variety.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"The way you like younger men, right? Men who have no desire  to settle down. You get rid of them before they can get rid of you.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Again, sleeping  with younger, sexy men who don't want to settle down is not a bad thing. I don't  want a house with a picket fence in suburbia. I'm not interested in family life,  but I like sex.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"And the loneliness, do you like that?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"I'm not lonely,\" she  said stubbornly. \"I'm independent. Men don't like a strong woman.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Strong men do.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Then I better start hanging out in gyms instead of bars.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"And strong women face  their fears. They talk about the painful choices they've made in their lives.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Meghann  actually flinched. \"Sorry, Harriet, I need to scoot. See you next week.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e She left  the office.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Outside, it was a gloriously bright June day. Early in the so-called  summer. Everywhere else in the country, people were swimming and barbecuing and organizing  poolside picnics. Here, in good ole Seattle, people were methodically checking their  calendars and muttering that it was June, damn it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Only a few tourists were around  this morning; out-of-towners recognizable by the umbrellas tucked under their arms.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Meghann finally released her breath as she crossed the busy street and stepped up  onto the grassy lawn of the waterfront park. A towering totem pole greeted her. Behind  it, a dozen seagulls dived for bits of discarded food.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e She walked past a park bench  where a man lay huddled beneath a blanket of yellowed newspapers. In front of her,  the deep blue Sound stretched along the pale horizon. She wished she could take comfort  from that view; often, she could. But today, her mind was caught in the net of another  time and place.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e If she closed her eyes--which she definitely dared not do--she'd  remember it all: the dialing of the telephone number, the stilted, desperate conversation  with a man she didn't know, the long, silent drive to that shit-ass little town up  north. And worst of all, the tears she'd wiped from her little sister's flushed cheeks  when she said, I'm leaving you, Claire.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Her fingers tightened around the railing.  Dr. Bloom was wrong. Talking about Meghann's painful choice and the lonely years  that had followed it wouldn't help.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Her past wasn't a collection of memories to  be worked through; it was like an oversize Samsonite with a bum wheel. Meghann had  learned that a long time ago. All she could do was drag it along behind her.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Each  November, the mighty Skykomish River strained against its muddy banks. The threat  of flooding was a yearly event; in a dance as old as time itself, the people who  lived in the tiny towns along the river watched and waited, sandbags at the ready.  Their memory went back for generations. Everyone had a story to tell about the time  the water rose to the second floor of so-and-so's house . . . to the top of the doorways  at the grange hall . . . to the corner of Spring and Azalea Streets. People who lived  in flatter, safer places watched the nightly news and shook their heads, clucking  about the ridiculousness of farmers who lived on the flood plain.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e When the river  finally began to lower, a collective sigh of relief ran through town. It usually  started with Emmett Mulvaney, the pharmacist who religiously watched The Weather  Channel on Hayden's only big-screen television. He would notice some tiny tidbit  of information, something even those hotshot meteorologists in Seattle had missed.  He'd pass his assessment on to Sheriff Dick Parks, who told his secretary, Martha.  In less time than it took to drive from one end of town to the other, the word spread:  This year is going to be okay. The danger has passed. Sure enough, twenty-four hours  after Emmett's prediction, the meteorologists agreed.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e This year had been no exception,  but now, on this beautiful early summer's day, it was easy to forget those dangerous  months in which rainfall made everyone crazy.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Claire Cavenaugh stood on the banks  on the river, her work boots almost ankle-deep in the soft brown mud. Beside her,  an out-of-gas Weed Eater lay on its side.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e She smiled, wiped a gloved hand across  her sweaty brow. The amount of manual labor it took to get the resort ready for summer  was unbelievable.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Resort.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e That was what her dad called these sixteen acres. Sam  Cavenaugh had come across this acreage almost forty years ago, back when Hayden had  been nothing more than a gas station stop on the rise up Stevens Pass. He'd bought  the parcel for a song and settled into the decrepit farmhouse that came with it.  He'd named his place River's Edge Resort and begun to dream of a life that didn't  include hard hats and earplugs and night shifts at the paper plant in Everett.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e At  first he'd worked after hours and weekends. With a chain saw, a pickup truck, and  a plan drawn out on a cocktail napkin, he began. He hacked out campsites and cleaned  out a hundred years' worth of underbrush and built each knotty pine riverfront cabin  by hand. Now, River's Edge was a thriving family business. There were eight cabins  in all, each with two pretty little bedrooms and a single bathroom and a deck that  overlooked the river.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e In the past few years, they'd added a swimming pool and a  game room. Plans for a mini golf course and a Laundromat were in the works. It was  the kind of place where the same families came back year after year to spend their  precious vacation time.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Claire still remembered the first time she'd seen it. The  towering trees and rushing silver river had seemed like paradise to a girl raised  in a trailer that only stopped on the poor side of town. Her childhood memories before  coming to River's Edge were gray: ugly towns that came and went; uglier apartments  in run-down buildings. And Mama. Always on the run from something or other. Mama  had been married repeatedly, but Claire couldn't remember a man ever being around  for longer than a carton of milk. Meghann was the one Claire remembered. The older  sister who took care of everything . . . and then walked away one day, leaving Claire  behind.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Now, all these years later, their lives were connected by the thinnest of  strands. Once every few months, she and Meg talked on the phone. On particularly  bad days, they fell to talking about the weather. Then Meg would invariably \"get  another call\" and hang up. Her sister loved to underscore how successful she was.  Meghann could rattle on for ten minutes about how Claire had sold herself short.  \"Living on that silly little campground, cleaning up after people,\" was the usual  wording. Every single Christmas she offered to pay for college.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e As if reading Beowulf  would improve Claire's life.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e For years, Claire had longed to be friends as well  as sisters, but Meghann didn't want that, and Meghann always got her way. They were  what Meghann wanted them to be: Polite strangers who shared a blood type and an ugly  childhood.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Claire reached down for the Weed Eater. As she slogged across the spongy  ground, she noticed a dozen things that needed to be done before opening day. Roses  that needed to be trimmed, moss that needed to be scraped off the roofs, mildew that  needed to be bleached off the porch railings. And there was the mowing. A long, wet  winter had turned into a surprisingly bright spring, and the grass had grown as tall  as Claire's knees. She made a mental note to ask George, their handyman, to scrub  out the canoes and kayaks this afternoon.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e She tossed the Weed Eater in the back  of the pickup. It hit with a clanging thunk that rattled the rusted bed.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Hey, sweetie.  You goin' to town?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e She turned and saw her father standing on the porch of the registration  building. He wore a ratty pair of overalls, stained brown down the bib from some  long-forgotten oil change, and flannel shirt.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e He pulled a red bandanna out of his  hip pocket and wiped his brow as he walked toward her. \"I'm fixing that freezer,  by the way. Don't you go pricing new ones.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e There wasn't an appliance made he couldn't  repair, but Claire was going to check out prices, just the same. \"You need anything  from town?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Smitty has a part for me. Could you pick it up?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"You bet. And have  George start on the canoes when he gets here, okay?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"I'll put it on the list.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"And have Teena bleach the bathroom ceiling in cabin six. It got mildewy this winter.\"  She closed the pickup's bed.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"You here for dinner?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Not tonight. Ali has a Tee  Ball game at Riverfront Park, remember? Five o'clock.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Oh, yeah. I'll be there.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Claire nodded, knowing that he would. He hadn't missed a single event in his granddaughter's  life. \"Bye, Dad.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e She wrenched the truck's door handle and yanked hard. The door  screeched open. She grabbed the black steering wheel and climbed up into the seat.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Dad thumped the truck's door. \"Drive safely. Watch the turn at milepost seven.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e She smiled. He'd been giving her that exact bit of advice for almost two decades.  \"I love you, Dad.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"I love you, too. Now, go get my granddaughter. If you hurry,  we'll have time to watch SpongeBob SquarePants before the game.\"#1 New York Times bestselling author of The Women","brand":"Ballantine Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46305035714789,"sku":"NP9780345519467","price":19.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780345519467.jpg?v=1767722504","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/between-sisters-isbn-9780345519467","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}