Chapter 7 Summary

In this chapter, Reta describes the genesis of her first novel My Thyme is Up. She relates its surprising success and its winning of the Offenden Prize a year previously. It was widely hailed as a "sunny" novel, but Reta dislikes the idea of being perceived as a sunny person. She feels a greater sense of affinity for Danielle Westerman's belief that everyone has a dark side and that truth is the fruit of acknowledging the presence of that darkness. Reta has some difficulty rejoicing in the success of her first novel.

During a short book-signing tour in Washington, D.C. that year, Reta had decided to go shopping in the tiny boutique district of Georgetown. Her daughter, Norah, would be celebrating her seventeenth birthday a week later and had expressed her desire for a beautiful scarf. Reta describes the boutiques and the...