436 pages ;26 cm
"Originally published as Preloved in the United Kingdom in 2023 by Simon & Schuster UK."--Title page verso.
City dweller Gwen feels like she's living a secondhand life. She's thirty-eight, perpetually single, and in dire need of a dentist's appointment. Her friends are busy procreating in the country, and conversations with her parents seem to revolve entirely around hedge borders and the trash pickup schedule. Above all she's lonely. But then, isn't everyone? Then she's let go from a job she drifted into a decade ago and never left, and Gwen realizes it's time to make a change, starting with cleaning out her apartment. In the charity shop where she literally and metaphorically unloads her baggage, she discovers a group of weird and wonderful people devoted to finding a new home for donated items that have lost their use elsewhere. Gwen volunteers there--and finds a new home for herself among her fellow workers while discovering joy in the untold stories of secondhand things. Now it's time for Gwen to get out of her life in pause, and to find a way to move forward with bravery and humanity--and more regular dental care.
1.Friendship--Fiction.2.Interpersonal relations--Fiction.3.Life change events--Fiction.4.Thrift shops--Fiction.5.Women--Conduct of life--Fiction.Dynamic Details