The Invisible Husband of Frick Island

December 1, 2020

In the New York Times best-selling Henry's People We Meet on Vacation, vivacious travel writer Poppy once vacationed yearly with straight-and-narrow best friend Alex, but their last vacation left their relationship in shreds, and Poppy must talk him into one last trip so they can right the balance. In Jenoff's The Woman with the Blue Star, 18-year-old Sadie Gault is hiding in the sewers after the liquidation of the Krak�w ghetto when she forms a tentative friendship with wealthy Polish girl Ella Stepanek (500,000-copy paperback and 10,000-copy hardcover first printing). In Just Last Night, the latest from the internationally best-selling McFarlane (If I Never Met You), Eve is still crushing on Ed, among their group of four forever best friends, but her questions about what might have been are interrupted by a catastrophe upending all their lives (50,000-copy first printing). Best-selling novelist/memoirist Maynard returns with Count the Ways, which tracks the fate of a family when the parents break up after an accident that permanently injures the youngest child (50,000-copy first printing). Oakley follows up You Were There Too, a LibraryReads pick whose film rights have been sold, with The Invisible Husband of Frick Island, featuring an ambitious young journalist disgruntled about having to cover a fundraiser on Chesapeake Bay's Frick Island until he discovers the townsfolk pretending to hear and see a man who's not there--all for the sake of his widow. Inspired by a real-life individual, Phillips's The Family Law stars a crusading young family lawyer in early 1980s Alabama whose efforts to help women escape abusive marriages brings death threats that eventually endanger a teenager she has befriended. In Shipman's latest, terminally ill Emily wants the lifelong friends she made at summer camp in 1985 to scatter her ashes at the camp, and The Clover Girls find another life-affirming request from her when they oblige (100,000-copy paperback and 10,000-copy hardcover first printing). No plot details yet on Weiner's That Summer, but the setting is sunstruck Cape Cod, and there's a 350,000-copy first printing. Weir's Katharine Parr, The Sixth Wife, tells the story of twice-widowed Katharine, cornered into marriage with Henry VIII and shamelessly used by an old lover after Henry's death.

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March 29, 2021
In the quirky latest from Oakley (You Were There Too), an outsider learns of strange happenings on a remote Maryland island. After Tom Parrish is presumed dead in a boating accident, his wife, Piper, stays on the three-mile strip of Frick Island, still walking the docks with an imagined version of Tom to chat with the other boatmen and eat dinner at the One-Eyed Crab. Journalist Anders Caldwell arrives to do a fluff piece on the annual Cake Walk celebration, and afterward receives an email from an anonymous source saying he’s missed the bigger story. He returns, assuming the tip was about climate change, only to learn how the other islanders play along with Piper’s “PBHEs” (post-bereavement hallucination experiences). He then secretly dedicates his flailing podcast to Piper’s “invisible husband” and her neighbors’ role in the charade. As the podcast begins to catch on, Anders races against the building of a new cell tower, which would bring data service to the island along with news of the now successful podcast, which is actually about them. Granted, much of the plot relies on coincidences and silly misunderstandings, but Oakley cultivates a genuine sense of hope and the outlandish things people do to support the ones they love. There’s little of consequence here, but it works as a light diversion. Agent: Stephanie Rostan, Levine Greenberg Rostan Literary.

April 1, 2021
Although Piper Parrish didn't grow up on Frick Island, she's lived there long enough to be accepted by the locals. So when her husband Tom's boat capsizes during a storm, the community comes together to support her--even if it means playing along with Piper's belief that Tom is still alive by talking to him like he's still there. Enter Anders Caldwell, a small-town journalist who expected more from his career than a dead-end job covering the annual cakewalk on a middle-of-nowhere island. But Anders isn't immune to Frick Island's charms, and he quickly realizes that the quirky locals would be the ideal subject for his latest project, a podcast called "What the Frick?" What begins as a portrait of a unique place threatened by global warming turns into an exploration of Piper's unusual way of coping with Tom's death--a story made more complex as Anders comes to care for the community and, especially, Piper. Oakley (You Were There Too, 2020) masterfully captures small-town idiosyncrasies in this lively story about grief, friendship, and community. Fans of Josie Silver and Katherine Center will feel right at home on Frick Island.

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Starred review from May 1, 2021

Budding journalist Anders Caldwell fancies himself a modern-day Clark Kent. He works for a small-town paper, but he's sure that his big break is just around the corner. He's disappointed that his new assignment is to report on a cake walk on Frick Island--a 1.2-mile strip of land 12 miles out in the Chesapeake Bay--and shocked that the island doesn't do internet, cell phones, cars, or change. And then there's Piper Parrish, the young wife of a local crab fisher, who talks to someone who's not there. Anders learns that Piper's husband disappeared at sea, but she insists he's still alive and present. The entire population of Frick Island entertains her fantasy. Anders soon realizes the story of Piper and her delusions would make a riveting podcast--perhaps called What the Frick?--but he must deceive the islanders to get the facts. As he grows to love the island and its residents, Anders discovers that he's not the only one with a private agenda: Piper and the town have their own secrets. VERDICT Fans of the delightfully bizarre and quaintly humorous will love Oakley's (You Were There Too) hopeful tale about the powerful bond of community and how far people will go to protect someone they love.--K.L. Romo, Duncanville, TX

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