"It's Christmastime in Russell, North Carolina. For Laurel Granger, the holiday can't pass quickly enough. With her fiteen-year marriage ending, the visit to her hometown is bound to be even more painful than usual. And the worst part will be looking at the lives of her mother, Pansy, and Pansy's gossipy group of friends, for whom life revolves around the plant, the aging textile mill where for decades they have found companionship, a modest livelihood, and a purpose.".

"But with her own marriage disintegrating - the full scope of the disaster hasn't become clear to her yet - Laurel has nowhere else to turn except Russell, and to the women of the plant. And soon what Laurel begins to see is not the stifling town she couldn't wait to leave, nor women whose lives seem petty and plain, but a place where powerful secrets have been kept ... where hearts and lives have been broken ... and where a group of extraordinary women may have a thing or two to teach her about life.

Most of all, as Laurel starts to live and even love a little again, she is faced with her mother, and her mother before her, and what their complex relationship has meant for Laurel all these years."--BOOK JACKET.