In Her Boots

May 23, 2022
Dell’Antonia (The Chicken Sisters) returns with a lively tale involving a famous globe-trotting author’s struggle to save her inheritance. Rhett Smith, 40, whose book The Modern Pioneer Girl’s Guide to Life has inspired hordes of women to travel alone, leaves Argentina and the wreckage of a breakup to take over the family farm in Bowford, N.H., after her grandmother’s death. On the way, Rhett stops in New York City to see her best friend, Jasmine, and do an interview on the Today Show. At the studio, she’s surprised to sees her 20-years-estranged mother, Margaret Pearl Gallagher, as a fellow guest. Panicked, she switches places with Jasmine. When Rhett and Jasmine arrive at the farm, keeping up the charade, Margaret is there, too, and explains she owns half of the farm and plans to sell it to the local college. Rhett’s dream of revitalizing the property into a modern working farm depends on whether she can buy her mother’s half, but an accident scuttles her loan. Meanwhile, Rhett reconnects with a former boyfriend and reflects on her complicated relationship with Margaret. Dell’Antonia offers an affecting take on damaged relationships, while keeping things light with descriptions of spunky farm animals and the quirks of rural life. The author’s fans will love this. Agent: Caryn Karmatz Rudy, DeFiore & Co.

July 29, 2022
Rhett Gallagher is a successful globetrotting author . . . except no one but her best friend Jasmine knows that fact. Rhett's Instagram, Modern Pioneer Girl, started as a way for Rhett to connect with others like herself for whom the expected path of college-and-9-5-job was not what they wanted. Using the pseudonym Maggie Strong, Rhett turns Modern Pioneer Girl into a best-selling book. Her grandmother's death brings her back home to the States and Jasmine convinces Rhett to agree to an appearance on the Today Show. When Rhett sees that her estranged mother is the other guest, Rhett forces Jasmine to be Maggie Strong on the air. This one lie leads to more lies and soon Rhett is forced to grapple with her complicated relationship with her mother and her own tendency to run away. While there are some plot contrivances that strain credibility, Dell'Antonia (The Chicken Sisters, 2020) has written another warm and humorous winner about family and moving beyond past hurts. Fans of The Pioneer Woman, Eat Pray Love, and other nonfiction accounts of female empowerment will enjoy this fictional take on authors like Cheryl Strayed and Elizabeth Gilbert.

COPYRIGHT(2022) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.