Award-winning author Miriam Toews's first novel tells the heartwarming story of two young mothers who set off on an adventure all their own, relying on luck, pluck, and friendship
Eighteen-year-old Lucy and her flamboyant friend Lish are two of the single moms who live in Have-a-Life, a housing project for single mothers better known as Half-a-Life. Lucy has no idea who the father of her son is, while Lish still pines for the father of her twins. Fathers aren't around much at the project. They're mostly the kind of people whose heads get cut out of pictures.
Life is tough for Lucy and Lish: Little Red Wagons and cheap strollers are the only way to get to and from the grocery store, and it's hard to make ends meet. So when Lish suggests a harebrained road trip in search of the fire-eater, Lucy can't help but be excited. They borrow a van held together with coat hangers and electrical tape, load it up with kids and clothes, and hit the road. Lucy tells her story in a wry, bittersweet voice that marks her as a literary sister to Nomi Nickel, the beloved narrator of Toews's A Complicated Kindness.
"A comic take on what initially appears to be a most improbable topic for humor--and it works." (Globe and Mail)
