On Sale Jan 26, 2027
Pre-Order Today!
Lushly immersive stories exploring the ties that bind women together
“The Carnation Milk Palace is an expansive, exquisitely written collection exploring longing, motherhood, friendship, and marriage. Pritchard creates characters and renders feeling with a precision I’ve never quite seen; she is a master storyteller.”—Karen E. Bender, author of Refund and The Words of Dr. L
Reviews for The Carnation Milk Palace
“
The women in these 11 exquisite stories face crucial experiences in their lives, including coming of age, experiencing grief, dealing with loss, and growing older. Pritchard (Flight of the Wild Swan) has an ear for dialog, an eye for detail, and a talent for creating engaging characters that are finely drawn, multidimensional, and far from stereotypical. Their stories are set in different times and places, from Venice in 1703 to Menlo Park, CA, in 1966 to southeast Georgia in 1932, but each one centers a woman who is coming into her own. Pritchard endows her characters with humor and grace, whether it’s a 14-year-old drinking her first glass of champagne and seeing her parents in an unflattering new light, a naive grandmother who realizes something awful about her late husband, or a pair of sisters of a certain age who reconnect and share secrets on a Viennese holiday. Themes of motherhood, friendship, marriage, memory, and forgiveness run through these stories like colorful threads in an intricate tapestry.