The Beach Street Knitting Society and Yarn Club

Smart novels about starting over don’t get any better than this sweet treat by Brit author McNeil (Divas Don’t Knit ). Jo Mackenzie, full-time mum to little rascals Jack and Archie, is blindsided when her foreign correspondent husband, Nick, admits to an affair and asks for a divorce, only to be killed soon after in a car crash. Now Jo must keep up an awkward grieving widow facade. When her grandmother offers Jo the family knit shop, Jo sells her London flat and moves to the small seaside town of Broadgate Bay. When she decides to start a “stitch and bitch” group above her shop, the ancient shop assistant resists her innovations, but happily, the woman’s son, Martin, is back in town and newly divorced. Then a chance encounter with a movie star, the town’s newest resident, adds to Jo’s misadventures. Readers will be kept in stitches by the mishaps and antics of Jo, an endearing Bridget Jones with baggage. McNeil’s top-notch writing and quick wit keep the plot spinning until the wholly satisfying, and not entirely expected, conclusion. (Mar.)