Big Cherry Holler

Adriana Trigiani published Big Cherry Holler in 2001. It takes up the life of Ave Maria Mulligan again, eight years after the events of the earlier book, by which time she has married Jack Mac and settled with him in the hills, and the book is as much about the town around her as about the marriage.

The mountains, the novel says, cannot shelter her from the harder lessons that come with loving people. As her life arrives at a crossroads she is surrounded by people with opinions: Iva Lou Wade, the bookmobile's self-appointed expert on matters of sex; Pearl Grimes, who runs the pharmacy and is, as the book says, a very mature twenty-four; the chain-smoking cashier Fleeta; and Theodore Tipton, the band director.

The turning point comes with a summer trip to Italy, taken with her daughter. There she meets a man who attracts her, and the encounter tests her marriage and forces her to decide what she actually wants, which is the decision the whole book is built around.