A sweeping story of lifelong best friends from Philadelphia Quaker families who share a vacation spot and a moral exigency. Dark confesses in her acknowledgments that she had "doubts about the appeal of two old ladies," but she's written the rare 592-page novel you'll be sorry to finish. Eighty-year-old spinster Agnes Lee is the successful author of two series of books. She's known for one of them, 30-plus children's tales about a 9-year-old named Nan. The other is written under a pseudonym, six sharp social satires following a circle of upper-class Philadelphia girls like the ones Agnes grew up with. But as the curtain opens in March 2000, Agnes is having her very first experience of writer's block, described in one of many astute passages about the writing life: "Agnes had lost hope for today, too, but her allotted writing time wasn't up yet. So she sat. Her rule was five hours, and dammit she'd put in five hours." Just as she packs it in for the day, her best friend, Polly Wister, a devoted wife and mother, arrives for a drink. "We have a problem," says Agnes. The problem is that they are two of the last three shareholders in Fellowship Point, a large, and largely undeveloped, piece of coastal property in Maine where their families have vacationed for generations. After the two of them are gone, Agnes' cousin, a wealthy dolt, seems likely to sell out to a developer who would tear down the 19th-century dwellings, destroy a nature sanctuary, and overrun an ancient Indigenous meeting ground to build a resort. Agnes and Polly have other problems, too, each of them held back by choices made long in the past, some of which will be dug out by a nosy young New York editor who's determined to make Agnes write a memoir. You will surely want to read this book, but you may be able to use its essential wisdom right now: "There wasn't time for withholding, not in this short life when you were only given to know a few people, and to have a true exchange with one or two." Elegantly structured, beautifully written, and altogether diverting, with a powerful message about land ownership in America. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Agnes Lee, a flinty 80-year-old descended from an old Philadelphia Quaker family, is famous for her children's books. But for her, those widely beloved tales are mere camouflage for her true calling, writing the pseudonymous Franklin Square novels, scathing works of social commentary pegged to the lives of five women friends. No one knows, not even her lifelong best friend, lovely Polly, who has devoted herself to caring for her pompous philosophy professor husband and ungrateful sons. Agnes and Polly's bond stems from their families' beloved summer homes on beautiful, unspoiled Fellowship Point, Maine. Now that the next generation is determined to sell the land to a developer, Agnes is adamant about protecting this bird sanctuary by creating a land trust. She is counting on Polly to help, but Polly is secretly contending with her husband's creeping dementia. Meanwhile, Maud, a smart and ambitious editorial assistant, tries to convince prickly Agnes to write a memoir. Each of Dark's captivating narrators is more than she seems, while the history of Fellowship Point is a microcosm of the conflict between human desires versus ecological viability. Capacious, psychologically fluent, funny, and intricately and meaningfully plotted, Dark's novel of love, trauma, guilt, and justice explores women's struggles, the devaluing of nature, and how stories are told and by whom.

Dark (Think of England) celebrates women's friendships and artistic mentorship in this expansive yet intimate novel. At the age of 80 in the year 2000, Agnes Lee is thinking about her legacy, especially following her third breast cancer diagnosis. While celebrated for writing a series of feminist children's books centered on a plucky character named Nan, Agnes is also secretly the author of a literary series for adults, published under a pseudonym. The fifth volume is due, but she's suffering from writer's block. Meanwhile, Agnes seeks support from her lifelong best friend, Polly, on her mission to donate a valuable stretch of land along the Maine coast held jointly by their families, rather than pass it to the next generation and risk it falling into the hands of developers. Blunt and self-reliant Agnes, who has no children, finds herself at loggerheads with Polly, who has several--and who, much to Agnes's everlasting frustration, invariably defers to her husband. The families and their grudges and grievances fill a broad canvas, and within it Dark delves deeply into the relationships between Agnes and her work, humans and the land, mothers and children, and, most indelibly, the sustenance and joy provided by a long-held female friendship. It's a remarkable achievement. (July)

In Dark's (Think of England) latest, octogenarians Agnes and Polly are childhood friends who grew up together in 1930s Philadelphia and summered at Fellowship Point, a coastal Maine peninsula shared by their Quaker families for generations. Their adult lives took different paths--Polly's was traditional, with a husband and children; while Agnes, who never married, found success writing beloved children's books about an adventurous girl named Nan. Now Agnes, nearing the end of her life, is approached by ambitious editor Maud to write her memoirs; Agnes is loath to reveal her secrets, even as the two become friends. Agnes is also conceiving a plan to save Fellowship Point from development, but it requires buy-in from the surviving stakeholders, and she and Polly fight over Polly's seeming unwillingness to convince her adult children to cooperate. Meanwhile, Maud pressures her to reveal more of herself in the memoir, and Agnes might not be able to preserve both the land and her secrets. VERDICT Dark's novel takes on serious topics, from patriarchy to capitalism, with a multifaceted main character and a story line that's as surprising as it is satisfying. Sure to please fans of literary women's fiction like the work of Elizabeth Strout.--Karen Core, Detroit P.L.