They May Not Mean To, But They Do

“A very funny novel . . . reminds us that a family is as united by its trials as by its triumphs. . . . deftly handled storytelling.” ―Penelope Lively, The New York Times Book Review

The Bergman clan has always stuck together, growing as it incorporated in-laws, ex-in-laws, and same-sex spouses. But families don't just grow, they grow old.

The clan’s matriarch, Joy, is not slipping into old age with the quiet grace her children, Molly and Daniel, would have wished. When Joy’s beloved husband dies, Molly and Daniel have no shortage of solutions for their mother’s loneliness and despair, but there is one challenge they did not count on: the reappearance of an ardent suitor from Joy’s college days. And they didn’t count on Joy herself, a mother suddenly as willful and rebellious as their own kids.

With sympathy, humor, and truth, Catherine Schine explores the intrusion of old age into a large and loving family. They May Not Mean To, but They Do is a radiantly compassionate look at three generations, all coming of age together.

“Shapely and precisely structured . . . ruefully satiric . . . buoyant . . . sharply observant. . . .[Schine's] tenth . . . novel . . . cuts deeper, feels fuller and more ambitious, and seems to me her best.” ―Phillip Lopate, New York Review of Books

“Schine’s painfully beautiful depiction of a woman’s heroism in the face of that abyss offers, like the best literature, a reminder of the tender, frightening vulnerability we all share.” ―Los Angeles Review of Books

“Emotionally stirring and hilarious.” ―Meg Wolitzer, author of The Interestings

“Oh, but you do need Schine's novel. At least, you do if you're a reader who relishes acute psychological perceptions and lots of laughs.” ―Maureen Corrigan, NPR

“Hugely satisfying.” ―Minneapolis Star Tribune