Three Days in June: A Novel

by Anne Tyler

Overview

Notes From Your Bookseller

At just 176 pages, Anne Tyler's latest is a big-hearted, charming and funny story about motherhood, marriage and life from a Pulitzer Prize-winning author.

“What a treat.” —Washington Post
“Simply exquisite.” —Liane Moriarty
“Nobody understands human nature better than Tyler. And nobody understands the complexities of love the way she does.” —Boston Globe
“Three Days in June is like reading a hug.” —Minneapolis Star Tribune

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A new Anne Tyler novel destined to be an instant classic: a socially awkward mother of the bride navigates the days before and after her daughter's wedding.

Gail Baines is having a bad day. To start, she loses her job—or quits, depending on whom you ask. Tomorrow her daughter, Debbie, is getting married, and she hasn’t even been invited to the spa day organized by the mother of the groom. Then, Gail’s ex-husband, Max, arrives unannounced on her doorstep, carrying a cat, without a place to stay, and without even a suit.

But the true crisis lands when Debbie shares with her parents a secret she has just learned about her husband to be. It will not only throw the wedding into question but also stir up Gail and Max’s past.

Told with deep sensitivity and a tart sense of humor, full of the joys and heartbreaks of love and marriage and family life, Three Days in June is a triumph, and gives us the perennially bestselling, Pulitzer Prize–winning writer at the height of her powers.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780593803493
Publisher:	Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Publication date:	02/11/2025
Sold by:	Random House
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
Sales rank:	570
File size:	7 MB

About the Author

ANNE TYLER was born in Minneapolis, MN, in 1941 and grew up in Raleigh, NC. She is the author of more than twenty novels. Her twentieth novel, A Spool of Blue Thread, was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2015. Her eleventh novel, Breathing Lessons, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1989. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She lives in Baltimore, MD.

Hometown:

Baltimore, Maryland

Date of Birth:

October 25, 1941

Place of Birth:

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Education:

B.A., Duke University, 1961

Editorial Reviews

11/18/2024

Bestseller Tyler (French Braid) returns with another appealing story of an idiosyncratic family. The day before her only daughter’s wedding, 61-year-old Gail Baines learns she’s been passed over for a promotion at the private girls’ school where she works as assistant headmistress, and that she’ll soon be replaced. That afternoon, her mild-mannered ex-husband, Max, shows up at her door with a cat he’s fostering, having been turned away by their daughter, Debbie, because her fiancé, Kenneth, is allergic to cats. Then Debbie tells Gail that Kenneth’s unreliable sister, Elizabeth, has just claimed he had a recent fling with another woman. Debbie isn’t sure if she believes Elizabeth, but Gail panics nonetheless. Still, the wedding proceeds as planned. The next day, Gail’s flashbacks to her marriage with Max lead to a surprising revelation. As in Tyler’s previous work, there’s not much of a plot, but the pleasure is in learning how her characters tick, as Gail time and again fails to find the proper tact. By the end of the story, messy human relationships are proven to be worth all the trouble they cause. This will gratify Tyler’s fans. Agent: Jesseca Salky, Salky Literary. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

Anne Tyler remains my favourite author in the world. I’ve adored everything she’s ever written. Three Days in June is, of course, simply exquisite.” —Liane Moriarty

“Tyler lights up the space between people, and shows how it feels to be on the outside looking in. This is her superpower.” —New York Times

“Another delightfully assured exploration of the way sorrow and joy meld together in the crucible of family life. . . . [It] seems to defy the conventions of romantic comedy until it finally, gloriously gives in. . . . What a treat to listen in on this banter. . . . Few writers can weave the threads of dialogue with such casual brilliance as Tyler. . . . She and her shelf of celebrated novels sit confidently at the end of a circuitous line that winds back through Jane Austen’s novels to Shakespeare’s comedies.” —Washington Post

“Spot on and often very funny. . . . Nobody understands human nature—the yearning, the envy, the sadness, the regret—better than Tyler. And nobody understands the complexities of love the way she does.” —Boston Globe

“Deeply compassionate and very witty. . . . The bad news: Anne Tyler can’t possibly write forever. The good news: Her latest novel proves that she’s still inimitable and still providing fresh perspectives on ordinary people.” —Los Angeles Times

“This is storytelling at its very best.” —Rachel Joyce, author of Miss Benson’s Beetle

“Three Days in June is like reading a hug. [Tyler] embraces us from the very first sentence. . . . You’ll want to stay in the warmth of her storytelling. Let it hug you, too, and don’t be afraid to give it a snuggle back. . . . Tyler’s pacing is incomparable.” —Minneapolis Star Tribune

“A wise, wonderful book. . . . Three Days in June takes two days to read, but it envelops you just the same, her characters so alive they could be sitting next to you telling you what happened to them last Tuesday—and the ending is a beauty.” —The Observer (London)

“Winningly deft. . . . For more than 60 years her clear-eyed but kindly approach to people moving through recognizable daily life has enabled her to serve up a convincing combination of sharpness, tenderness, mild satire and rueful comedy, not just in a single book, but sometimes in a single sentence.” —The Times (London)

“As word gets out, all fiction lovers seeking a smart, sunny novel will ask for this one. . . . [A] delectable, tightly focused, and piquant comedy. . . . Tyler is exceptionally adept at exhilarating dialogue and the nuances of relationships. . . . With every character, cat included, incisively and vividly realized, and myriad preoccupations and emotions limned with nimble wit and empathy, this is a keen delight.” —Booklist

“Sweet, sharp, and satisfying. . . . Tyler’s touch is as delicate, her empathy for human beings and all their quirks as evident in her 25th work of fiction as it was in her first, published an astonishing 60 years ago.” —Kirkus Reviews

“As always, it’s sublimely written and beautifully observed.” —Good Housekeeping

“Anne Tyler’s novels plumb the everyday to make magic. . . . Beneath the tidy crust of her plainsong sentences, as ever, seethes the lava of familial and marital relations. . . . Tyler is too deep and nimble a writer, of course, to skate dramedy grooves, though much of her droll banter would shine in a screenplay; she ballasts Three Days in June with the hard weight of life. (Not for nothing did she major in Russian literature.) . . . Family life [is] the source of the unexpectedly heart-busting poignancy at the novel’s close. Are families absolutely, intrinsically interesting? Updike asked. Anne Tyler’s are. Just ask the people at the coffee shop who saw me wiping my eyes as I closed this novel shut.” —Garden & Gun

“Three Days in June is a valentine to readers. It’s funny and touching. . . . There isn’t a wrong move in it. It’s the literary equivalent of a box of chocolates with no duds. . . . If you’re looking for a deeply humane writer abounding in wit and wisdom, read Anne Tyler.” —Christian Science Monitor

“With flairs for ingenuity and dexterity, she creates a tapestry of family issues. . . . In the words of singer Celine Dion, perhaps for Gail ‘it’s all coming back for me now.’ As it will for Tyler’s devoted admirers.” —Richmond Times-Dispatch

“Tyler’s trademark witticisms and creation of vulnerable characters shows us just how precious life can be.” —Minnesota Monthly

“Written in Anne Tyler’s warm and wonderful style, this is a heart-warming story you’ll fall in love with. . . . Witty, thoughtful and brilliantly character-driven.” —Woman and Home

From the Publisher

Anyone who has been a member of a wedding party will be captivated by Anne Tyler's latest audiobook, appealingly narrated by J. Smith-Cameron. She captures the intonation and Mid-Atlantic accent 61-year-old Gail, the bride's mother, whose job as an assistant principal is suddenly at risk on the eve of her daughter Debbie's wedding. Gail's ex-husband, Max, shows up unexpectedly on her doorstep, seeking a place to stay with the cat he is fostering. At the same time, Debbie has learned that her fiancé may have cheated on her. Smith-Cameron keeps listeners oriented as the story shifts from the present-day festivities to flashbacks of Max and Gail's married days. Smith-Cameron deftly conveys Tyler's shrewd observations on marriage and family while illuminating the relatable story's poignancy and humor. M.J. © AudioFile 2025, Portland, Maine

JANUARY 2025 - AudioFile

2024-10-26
Their daughter’s wedding stirs up uncomfortable memories for a divorced couple.

The day before the ceremony, the bride’s mother, Gail Baines, second in command at the Ashton School in Baltimore, learns that not only has she been passed over to replace the retiring headmistress, but the new recruit is bringing her deputy with her. The lack of people skills that have cost Gail this promotion are evident even in that initial scene; she’s a classic cranky Tyler protagonist, given to blurting out her opinions with little consideration for others’ feelings. Her first-person narration also reveals her to be touchingly vulnerable, convinced that daughter Debbie, prettier and more polished than she, will inevitably prefer husband-to-be Kenneth’s overbearing, better-off parents. Although her divorce from Max was amicable, Gail considers him a bit of a slacker, and isn’t best pleased when he turns up with a rescue cat in tow and says he has to stay with her because Kenneth is horribly allergic. A startling revelation from Debbie, fresh from her pre-wedding “Day of Beauty,” immediately divides the exes, who have very different opinions about how their daughter should handle this crisis. It also leads to Gail’s revelation of the infidelity that led to their divorce, though not in the way readers might imagine. Laid-back Max is the only fully fleshed character here other than Gail, and the novel is very short, but Tyler’s touch is as delicate, her empathy for human beings and all their quirks as evident in her 25th work of fiction as it was in her first, published an astonishing 60 years ago. Gail’s acerbic observations about the wedding and all its participants, her wistful memories of her odd-couple romance with Max, and her account of their enforced intimacy over the three days surrounding the wedding alternate to poignant effect. The closing pages offer a happy ending that feels true to the characters and utterly deserved.

Sweet, sharp, and satisfying.

Kirkus Reviews