Husbands & Lovers

In the engrossing latest from Williams (The Beach at Summerly), a single mother reconnects with her son’s father and learns the troubling story of her mother’s adoption. In the present day, Mallory Dunne’s 13-year-old son, Sam, needs a kidney transplant. Three years earlier, Sam’s kidneys were damaged after he ate poisonous mushrooms at a summer camp. Paige, Mallory’s sister, suggests Mallory contact her ex-boyfriend Monk Adams, now a world-famous Grammy-winning singer, who may be Sam’s father, to determine if he’s a potential donor match. In a parallel narrative set in 1951 Cairo, Hannah Ainsworth, wife of aging British diplomat Alistair Ainsworth, embarks on an affair with Lucien Beck, a handsome assistant hotel manager. After Hannah gets pregnant, Alistair forces her to give up the baby for adoption at an Irish orphanage. Back in the present, Mallory briefs Monk about Sam, and their rekindled friendship causes him to recognize the flaws in his relationship with the woman he plans to marry. Hannah’s and Mallory’s parallel stories of unexpected pregnancy and painful decisions converge in a cathartic scene in Ireland, where Mallory and Paige travel to visit the orphanage where their deceased mother was sent, connecting their story to Hannah’s in a way that is unsurprising but moving. Historical fiction fans will be riveted. Agent: Alexandra Machinist, CAA. (June)