On a Tuesday morning in 2024, three Atlanta-based women receive the unfathomable news that the fourth member of their close-knit friend group is missing. From that devastating moment, various flashbacks reveal significant moments from the years and months leading up to the tragic revelation, uncovering the fractures in each woman’s seemingly ideal life: Stephanie Summer Rapputo was a Juilliard hopeful who struggles to find satisfaction in her roles as a wife and mother; Andrea Raznick Duncan tamps down her frustration at being overlooked again and again, despite her advanced degrees and expertise, for a promotion at the investment firm where she works; Molly Kimbrough Milford is recovering from chemotherapy while struggling to connect with her teenage daughter; and Catherine “Cat” Martin Wray has finally opened her dream bookstore, but she does so alone after one terrible decision results in her husband moving out with their daughters. Congregating for book club meetings at Cat’s bookstore, the four women share vulnerable truths about themselves as they unknowingly hurtle toward that fateful Tuesday morning. From the opening line, Carro’s poetic prose invites readers to slow down and examine the quieter moments of life: “That early in the morning, a ringing phone can only mean that someone or something is lost or left—that some calamity, be it mundane or monumental, has occurred, spiraling the day off-kilter.” While the pacing sags a bit in places, the nonlinear timeline helps keep things lively by adding a touch of suspense to an otherwise straightforward emotional drama. The result is a quietly devastating look at the roles that women often assign themselves at the expense of their own desires. Carro’s thoughtful musings on friendship, loss, and the unexpected directions life can take are almost certain to stay with readers long after the last page.