Book Lovers

At the restaurant, Charlie and Nora joke about Blake and the items on Nora’s checklist. It turns out that they both have younger sisters who are more carefree and spontaneous than they are. Charlie’s sister, Carina, takes after his mother, Sally, who went off painting in Italy when she was in her twenties. Sally then met and married Charlie’s father, a more secure small-town contractor. Nora tells Charlie about her mom, who made life in New York City magical on a tight budget. She also tells him about spending her childhood in Mrs. Freeman’s bookshops, where she took her first steps toward building a literary career as a child when she wrote reviews for the books. Nora describes her younger self as a “child editor” who changed the endings of books for Libby when they were unsatisfying or added female heroines (156). She reveals that editing was her first love, but she gave it up when she found more secure and lucrative work as a junior agent.

Charlie’s story of becoming an editor is more unconventional. He was behind at school until he realized that he was interested in how things were constructed. Although he began by learning about cars, he eventually moved on to the construction of books. He had to go to community college and work in construction for a few years before he could afford to move to New York City. While he originally wanted to be a writer, he found that he enjoyed working on other people’s stories more. When Nora confesses that this is her favorite part of the job, too, Charlie offers that she might be in the wrong job. She dodges the issue.

Charlie is surprised that Nora will be staying in Sunshine Falls for a month. They stage a bet that if Nora gets to the end of Libby’s list, then Charlie will allow Libby and her family to sublet his rent-stabilized apartment in the city. Sexual tension mounts between them in the meantime.

Charlie offers to walk Nora home. On the way, she sees a shortcut to the cottage and a swimming hole. This is an opportunity for her to check No. 6 off Libby’s list: skinny-dipping. She strips down to her underwear, even removing her bra to fully fulfill the list item. Charlie enters the water to challenge Nora’s pretense that he cannot swim. The sexual chemistry between them mounts, and they almost have sex; however, Nora cuts things short when she receives a voicemail from Dusty and anxious messages from Libby. Nora is worried about getting carried away after what happened with Jakob. Charlie is disappointed that he and Nora cannot be in a real relationship but admits that things are complicated for him, too.

Nora wakes up extremely self-conscious and vomits on her run. She runs into the golden-haired man, Shepherd, and they have a flirty exchange and promise to see each other again.

However, she cannot stop herself thinking about Charlie. To her surprise, Libby’s husband, Brendan, messages her to check up on Libby. Libby seems frustrated with Brendan, but Nora has no idea why. Libby has plans to revive Charlie’s family’s store, Goode Books, in keeping with the goals on the list, and goes on a cleaning and second-hand-furniture hunting spree for the store. Nora tries to avoid Charlie’s gaze while they are at the bookstore. Libby then drags Nora to a town meeting, which Charlie is attending to vote on a project of his mother’s. They talk about Dusty’s newest book, Frigid. Charlie thinks that the fatal accident suffered by the heroine, Nadine, should be the novel’s starting place, but Nora worries about losing all context for the character. Charlie argues that “we need to see Nadine exactly as the world sees her, before the curtain gets pulled back” (188). Nora agrees with him and offers to talk to Dusty about cutting the first 50 pages. Nora discovers that the motion they are there to vote on is the construction of an Old Man Whittaker statue from Once in a Lifetime.

Charlie and Nora edit Dusty’s work via email, and she approves the changes. Charlie comments that he and Nora make a good team. Meanwhile, Libby looks concerned and disappears, and Nora becomes concerned about her. Nora feels the urge to confide in Charlie but resists it. They leave the shop at five, and Charlie is beginning to ask Nora if everything is all right when Shepherd appears. Nora senses that Shepherd and Charlie have past tension. Shepherd immediately invites Nora to take a tour with him, and she hops into his van with mixed feelings. Although Shepherd is physically attractive, Nora does not experience the same butterflies with him as she does with Charlie. Shepherd begins to make some disparaging remarks about Charlie but cuts himself off. Although Shepherd is a country-music-listening carpenter who was a high school quarterback, he also went to prestigious Cornell University. He drives Nora to the Blue Ridge Parkway and the yellow house he constructed. Shepherd puts on music and invites her to dance. To her surprise, Nora agrees.

Nora reaches the point of a kiss with Shepherd, but—although it fulfills all the tropes of romance novels—she is too caught up in Charlie to go through with it. The next day, Charlie seems jealous, and Nora is, in turn, jealous that he has a date with Amaya. She insists that they meet to discuss the next round of edits on the book in person, and he reserves them a room at the library. Meanwhile, Libby is still being evasive and snappy, especially over the subject of Brendan.

The next day, Libby drags Nora to a local play of Once in a Lifetime. A child plays Old Man Whittaker, and the sisters laugh and bond with each other. After the performance, Sally, Charlie’s mother, catches up with them and takes them to her home for a post-show party. Libby becomes moody, and Nora speculates that her sister’s list might have something to do with a trial run at making it without her husband, Brendan. Nora feels unsettled, and then Libby spots Shepherd and swoons. He walks over to them.

Nora discovers that Shepherd and Charlie are cousins who were close as youngsters but drifted apart. Shepherd works with Charlie’s dad, Clint. Nora reels at the realization that she almost kissed Charlie’s cousin while still being smitten with Charlie. She spots some beautiful erotic nude paintings and is surprised to discover that Sally is the artist. Sally admits that as a child, she wanted to be a painter. She dated Clint, but they broke up after she left to study art in Florence, Italy, before moving to New York’s Alphabet City to try to make it as an artist. She was successful, but after her career took off, Sally became disillusioned with fame, moved to Sunshine Falls, got back together with Clint, and settled down. Libby, who is also there, speaks about her own mother and remembers a different version of the charmed, if erratic, childhood Nora recalls. Libby tells Sally that her mother, like Nora, exhausted herself by devoting her life to her career. While Libby’s tone is jovial, Nora senses a “thorny” truth beneath her words (223). Nora is hurt because she thought Libby always saw through her “shark” exterior, but now she realizes that this is not the case. She dashes off and, finding Charlie’s room, relaxes there. She reflects on Libby’s negative view of her childhood and concludes that she devoted herself to her career in order to not let the vision of life that “Mom wanted for us to slip away” (226). However, she realizes that her ambition to make life work in the city has caused a rift between her and Libby and that Libby does not see her clearly or trust her enough to confide in her. Charlie comes in and asks her what happened.

Nora confesses to Charlie that she is hurt because she always felt like “the wrong kind of woman” but thought that Libby saw her differently (227). Charlie says that there is nothing wrong with Nora because she is a passionate woman who cares “ten times more than the average person,” not only about her job, but about everything (228). Nora realizes that he has been watching her closely and knows her better than almost everyone else. He then tells Nora about the troubles he had growing up in the town, as the townsfolk did not approve of his family. He fills in the gaps in the story Sally shared with Nora by revealing that Sally was three months pregnant with Charlie when she became engaged to Clint. Charlie’s biological father is a curator in the city, and, while he loves Clint, he feels that they are very different. Worse, Charlie found out about his true parentage in fifth grade from kids at school. Rumors of his mother’s alleged promiscuity also reached his young sister’s ears. Charlie reassures Nora that she will never lose Libby, and Nora feels safe and close to him.

However, messages from Libby and the complication of Charlie’s relationship with Amaya force them apart. On the ride home, Libby acts normal, but Nora cannot help thinking about her relationship with Brendan and her comments about Nora being exhausted by her career, like their mother.

Things remain strained between Nora and Libby, and when Nora goes to meet Charlie at the library to edit Dusty’s book, Brendan sends a message inquiring about Libby.

As they begin the editing process, Charlie remarks that Nora is good at it. She confesses that she backed out of the second interview for an editing job because Brendan got laid off at the same time that Libby became pregnant. Nora decided she needed to keep her lucrative agenting job to help them out but did not tell Libby about it. Charlie encourages Nora to return to editing.  

Nora reveals that she just found out that Shepherd is Charlie’s cousin, and she would not have gone out with him if she had known. She then asks about Charlie and Amaya. Charlie replies that they are ex-fiancés and went on a date to clear the air. When Charlie asks her what she wants, Nora replies, “I want to be here with you and not worry about what comes next” (243). They make out and almost have sex before deciding that a library table and a time limit are not the best setting for that.

Before Nora goes to meet Libby at Poppa Squat’s, she wants to call Shepherd to let him know she is not interested. Instead, she accidentally calls the number Sally left for Libby, a family law attorney. She speculates that Libby asked Sally for a divorce lawyer’s number. She remembers the period after her mother’s death when she was comforting Libby from despair but decided to go to Los Angeles. After that, Libby lost her career ambition, and when she met Brendan, she decided not to finish school. They quickly became engaged, and Libby felt happy. Now, with the prospect of Libby’s divorce, Nora feels that Libby needs her but she hasn’t been there for her. Nora is terrified and realizes she has been working nonstop to escape the past. She determines to protect Libby at any cost.

Libby wants to host an event called the Blue Moon Ball as a fundraiser for the bookshop and to hire Dusty for a virtual Q&A session. Nora agrees because it will make Libby happy.

Dusty agrees to Nora’s proposition, and Libby seems happy, even though Nora is unsettled by the fact that Brendan did not reply to her query about whether something was going on between him and Libby. While Libby gets the fundraiser on the way, Charlie and Nora sneak off, and Charlie sets up a tent in the cottage garden for Nora and Libby to sleep under. When Nora marvels at Charlie’s ability to set up a tent, he says that he used to camp a lot with Clint, but now Clint does not want him around. He says that his parents disapproved of his choice to work in the city over working for one of them. Charlie feels useless at only being able to help out in the store while Shepherd helps Charlie’s dad. Nora asks what happened with Amaya. Charlie says that she was his first love, and he followed her to NYU. However, when she wanted to move back to North Carolina, they had different ideas about how their lives should be. When they finally broke up, Sally got upset and told Charlie that he was going to end up making the same mistakes she did. Then, he found out that Amaya and Shepherd started dating. Charlie feels insecure around Shepherd because he went to his top-choice school, Cornell, and is the son Charlie’s parents wanted. Amaya also hinted that Charlie was too boring for her and that every day with him would be the same, and she wanted kids while he did not. Nora is also clear that she does not want children, as, like Charlie, she is afraid of the responsibility.

Nora tells Charlie her secret suspicion that Libby is getting divorced. While Nora feels useless that Libby has not confided in her, Charlie reassures her that her presence itself is the most important thing.

Libby and Nora sleep in the tent Charlie set up for them. Libby decides she likes Charlie, and Nora and Charlie text each other about the book and chat about other things. Nora feels energized and concludes that while her life has been an exercise in superhuman levels of self-control, she wants Charlie more than anything. She is enjoying the present so much that she half dreads the future that she will face when she goes back to the city.