Mothers and Other Strangers

Haydu’s wonderful adult debut (after the middle grade fantasy One Jar of Magic) explores the interwoven lives of two families. After free-spirited Joni Dyer moves from Manhattan to suburban Sommersette, Mass., with her husband and their three-year-old daughter, Mae, she becomes best friends with neighbor Beth Ann Sullivan, a more conventional woman whose own daughter, Sydney, is also three. As the girls grow up, only Sydney is aware of the affair between her father, Barrett, and Joni, which ends in tragedy when Joni dies from a bee sting the night of Mae’s high school graduation. The girls keep in touch until their early 20s, when Mae finds out about the affair and ends their friendship. By the time they’re in their 30s both are pregnant and living in New York City. Sydney is married and has joined her mother at a midlevel marketing company that sells pashminas, while Mae, an artist, is single and living off the sale of a painting depicting her and Sydney as girls, which she made shortly after their rupture. Mae and Sydney eventually reconnect after Sydney reaches out via email, and they sift through their parents’ failed relationships and their own. Haydu expertly seeds the narrative with clues about the consequences of Joni and Barrett’s affair and stacks the plot with surprises. It’s a beautiful tale of complicated friendships. Agent: Victoria Marini, High Line Literary Collective. (Mar.)