"Julie Fingersh's Stay is so rich, wise, funny, and beautifully written. It's hard to put down once you start."
--Anne Lamott, #1 New York Times bestselling author
Named one of Zibby Owens's Most Anticipated Books of Fall 2024
"Fingersh's story should help readers dealing with family secrets and mental and physical health issues feel less alone."--Booklist
Called "Rich, wise, funny, and beautifully written" by #1 New York Times bestselling author Anne Lamott, Stay : A Story of Family, Love, and Other Traumas is a riveting debut that captures the joyous and painful complexity of family love and loyalty, the cost of family secrets, and the quest to help the people we love most without losing our own way. It's also a rare window into two of the biggest epidemics gripping society today: mental illness and chronic illness and the ways in which they affect relationships, personal identity, and the blueprint of our lives.
Told through the eyes of the author as both a young sibling and a mid-life parent, Julie Fingersh seamlessly weaves together present and past, unlocking the puzzle of her early adulthood with her struggling brother from the vantage point of a mid-life parent on the verge of an empty nest and her next chapter, just as her college-bound daughter's life suddenly careens off track.
Sparkling with warmth, wit, and lyrical prose, Fingersh provides insight and sustenance for everyone wrestling with mid-life's ghosts, parenting adult children, and the twin pillagers of fear and the inner critic. Above all, Stay is for readers who want to think, feel, laugh, cry, and perhaps see their own life's trajectory and path forward with new eyes.