Critics' Opinion:
Readers' rating:
Published Jun 2023
304 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
An outrageously funny debut novel about a woman who moves to a small beach town looking for peace, only to find herself in an all-out war with her neighbors.
When Kathleen Deane's husband, Tom, tells her he's no longer happy with his life and their marriage, Kathleen is confused. They live in Kansas. They've been married thirty years. Who said anything about being happy? But with Tom off finding himself, Kathleen starts to think about what she wants. And her thoughts lead her to a small beach community on the east coast, a town called Whitbey that has always looked lovely in the Christmas letters her childhood friend Josie sends every year.
It turns out, though, that life in Whitbey is nothing like Josie's letters. Kathleen's new neighbor, Rosemary, is cantankerous, and the town's supervisor won't return Kathleen's emails, but worst of all is the Sugar Cube, the monstrosity masquerading as a holiday home that Kathleen's absentee neighbors are building next door to her quaint (read: tiny) cottage. As Kathleen gets more and more involved in the fight against the Sugar Cube and town politics overall, she realizes that Whitbey may not be a fairytale, but it just might be exactly what she needed.
Save What's Left can best be described as the "un-beach read." It pulls back the curtain on life in a beach town, revealing the true cost of a pretty view. Told from the candid and irreverent perspective of a newcomer turned local, this is a story of forgiveness, fortitude, and second chances.
"Castellano's wickedly funny debut unfurls in miserable yet gleeful detail the soul-sucking nightmare of owning a house on the Long Island oceanfront.... Clearly, the key requirement for successful beach house ownership is a (possibly illegal) sense of humor. Bring it on!" —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Castellano turns the beach-read genre on its head in her clever debut.... Kathleen's character and worldview are impeccably drawn, thanks to Castellano's idiosyncratic and assured voice. This witty send-up is a winner." —Publishers Weekly
"Funny and relatable, this fast-paced debut novel is guaranteed to give pause to anyone thinking about moving to a beach town." —Library Journal
"Laugh-out-loud funny, Save What's Left is a novel about life in a town that makes the perfect escape." —Today.com
"In this hilarious farce, we realize that paradise really is anything but when you actually live there."
—Good Housekeeping
"I loved every page of Save What's Left—this voice, this eye, this story, its originality and wit, its offbeat social satire, its loopy cynicism, and a whole town's good intentions gone awry. Fighting city hall has never been so delicious. Brava, Elizabeth Castellano. I can't wait for your next book."
—Elinor Lipman, author of Rachel to the Rescue
"Save What's Left is an absolute delight. It's laugh out loud funny and full of heart. I loved it." —J. Courtney Sullivan, New York Times bestselling author of Friends and Strangers
This information about Save What's Left was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Elizabeth Castellano grew up in a beach town. She lives in New York. Save What's Left is her debut novel.
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