How Close We Come: A Novel of Women's Friendships [Hardcover]

Susan S. Kelly (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 1998

Pril Henderson and Ruth Campbell have been best friends and next-door neighbors for a decade. They share their most intimate thoughts and wishes, their private hopes and dreams. Even their children are best friends. So when Ruth goes on vacation with her children and never returns, Pril is hurt, confused, and lonely. And when Ruth's husband names Pril as his witness in custody proceedings, she faces one of the most wrenching decisions of her life: Does she testify against her dearest friend? Or does she stand behind the woman who has inexplicably shattered her family? With lyricism, warmth, and uncanny perception, this novel explores what binds women to one another, how close we come to really knowing another, and why we hurt the ones we love the most.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing (September 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446524182
• ISBN-13: 978-0446524186
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.8 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.3 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,994,954 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Susan Stafford Kelly was raised in Rutherfordton, North Carolina. She attended St. Catherine's School, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and earned her Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Warren Wilson College. She has been a fellow at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts and taught Creative Writing for the North Carolina Writers Network, at UNC-Greensboro, Salem College, and the summer program at Woodberry Forest School. Susan's novel HOW CLOSE WE COME won the Carolina Novel Award in 1997 and was reissued nationally in 1998 by Warner Books. German and Russian rights were sold and the book was an Alternate Selection in the Book-of-the-Month Club. Her second novel, EVEN NOW, followed in July of 2001. THE LAST OF SOMETHING was published by Pegasus Books in 2006, followed by NOW YOU KNOW in 2008. Her newest and 5th novel, BY ACCIDENT is forthcoming from Pegasus Books in April 2010. Susan is a member of the North Carolina Writers Conference. She and her husband Sterling live in Greensboro, NC and have three children.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Women's Ties that Bind, August 12, 2001

By 

BeachReader (Delaware) - See all my reviews

This review is from: How Close We Come: A Novel of Women's Friendships (Paperback)

I read this first novel by Susan S. Kelly in about 3 hours. The author lives in Greensboro, NC, where this book takes place. In a nutshell, this is a novel about women's friendships....plain writing that evoked many feelings and memories of the time when my children were younger and friendships with other women were of the utmost importance. Not that such friendships are not important now, but when my children were pre-school, friends were life savers. The mothers' network (my term) kept our bodies and souls together, and our sanity somewhat intact.

Some memories this book stirred:

* finding a stray Christmas present in March because I had hidden it so well!

* the pre-dawn line in the church parking lot for pre-school registration - first come, first served

* playing "Beauty Shop" with my daughter - she "fixed me up"-- hair, makeup, nails, etc.! What a hoot that was!

* meeting new neighbors and taking them on "orientation" trips around the community

* the desperate search for daytime babysitters so one could go to the dentist

Here is something from the book that really made an impact:

"Details.

Psychiatrists and theorists and essayists, and yes, feminists, dissect and analyze and assign universal themes and theories to explain what binds women: the desire to nurture, the experience of childbirth, the constant striving to succeed in a male-dominated world. And surely these are our common causes.

But what truly, more accurately, binds women is the incremental collective trivia of hilarities and heartbreaks, humiliation and hum-drum amassed over telephones and fences, over laundry baskets and garden beds, on back stoops and park benches, in driveways and dry cleaners, in checkout lanes and carpool lines.

It's the parallel details of their existence which bind and entwine women with one another: the minutae of children and husbands and homes. Bound by the perpetual presence of smudges on windows from children's hands and lips; by fending off dinnertime solicitations; by dust balls the size of mice beneath beds; by sick days and snow days; by the availability of babysitters; by short-lived forays into extra-curricular activities and self-improvement; by periods of sheer maintenance with no forward progression, waiting only for time to pass."

Pril and Ruth have been next-door neighbors and best friends for ten years, as have their children. The women are closer than sisters. One day, Ruth leaves to vacation in Colorado with her children, and never returns. She does not call or write to explain why she has left. This book explores the basis of the friendship and some difficult choices Pril must make when Ruth's husband sues for custody of their children.

This is a powerful book that will stay with me for a long while.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars I cried my way through this story, January 24, 2000

By 

Linda Kuhlman (Roswell, GA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: How Close We Come: A Novel of Women's Friendships (Hardcover)

This book really struck a nerve with me - it has justified my very special relationship I have with my best friend. Sometimes the guys just don't get it, and even I have found it hard to understand how this relationship has developed. For me, this story has answered questions I have had within myself about why women are so important to each other. Read it and weep - I cried through much of the story as I found myself living this story.

11 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars WHY we women need one another, September 5, 2000

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: How Close We Come: A Novel of Women's Friendships (Paperback)

This book was required reading for a class I took entitled "Politics of Gender". I was also fortunate to have a friend of the author as a classmate, who arranged for Susan to come to class one evening as a guest speaker. This book has meant so much to me, as I have read it twice (and am now reading it for the third time) and have bought several copies to pass onto friends (I am hanging onto my autographed copy like gold!). I first read it at time when I was in mourning over the loss of a close friendship and felt uncomfortable about all the pain I was going through. This book validated that what I felt was normal for a heterosexual female. Two years later, the pain has led me to a better place. Susan told me that pain is necessary for growth and she is 100% accurate. Today I have moved beyond the pain, but still lack a lot of contact with other women. I have a number of long time friends, but our lives have all gone in very different directions, and as a result of that we do not see one another very often. For now I rely on re-reading Susan's book and watching videos of Mary and Rhoda. THANK YOU, Susan, your book has saved my life emotionally!