WHAT A WOMAN MUST DO

In a disappointingly maudlin story, three women shaped by past sadness confront the possibilities of hope over three momentous days.

Sullivan revisits the small town of Harvester, Minnesota (The Empress of One, 1996, etc.), where memories are long and everybody knows your business. The time is summer, the year 1952, and the day Wednesday—the tenth anniversary of the fatal car crash of Archer and Celia Canby. The couple left a small daughter Bess, now 17; and she, her great-aunt Kate, and her middle-aged cousin Harriet are the three narrators. Kate, afflicted by painful arthritis, can't forgive Archer, a drunk and abusive man, for causing Celia's death. And lately, too, she can’t stop remembering the happy times she spent when she and her own late husband Martin still owned the farm outside Harvester, before they had to sell it back during the Depression. Bess, on the other hand, soon to go off to college, is full of life and eager to fall in love, which she does that same Wednesday night when she goes dancing with friend Donna and meets married Korean War vet Doyle Hanlon. Cousin Harriet is also out dancing the same night, hoping that widower farmer DeVore will finally propose to her and allow her to live the life she has dreamed of since moving away from her cold and critical parents. As Harriet's wishes come true, Kate, who has caught a glimpse of Bess riding in a strange car, worries that the girl may be harmed, as her mother was, by falling for the wrong kind of man. Bess, convinced that she's in love with Doyle, is soon ready to give up college and become his mistress, even if it might cause a scandal and deeply wound Kate and Harriet. All too neatly, however, a broken-down car and sudden death resolve matters for all three of these women, who, however well drawn, remain stuck in a pulp-fiction world.

Not Sullivan’s best.