After the death of her best friend, the loss of her life's savings, and the collapse of her once-happy marriage, Meredith Maran-whom Anne Lamott calls "insightful, funny, and human"-leaves her San Francisco freelance writer's life for a 9-to-5 job in Los Angeles.

Determined to rebuild not only her savings but herself while relishing the joys of life in La-La land, Maran writes "a poignant story, a funny story, a moving story, and above all an American story of what it means to be a woman of a certain age in our time" (Christina Baker Kline, number-one New York Times-bestselling author of Orphan Train).