Rules for Visiting (Penguin Press, $26) is a terrifi cally smart novel about the changing contours of friendship in the digital age, as told through the experiences of May Attaway, a charming, idiosyncratic, and stubborn recluse whose world revolves around the trees and plants she landscapes on the grounds of a local university. Attaway lives in her childhood home with her aging father and suddenly finds herself with unexpected time off from her job. She decides to visit four far-fl ung friends, none of whom she has seen in years. Having never ventured beyond her carefully constructed, solitary existence, she relies on her knowledge of classical literature and a few how-to manuals to guide her into unfamiliar terrain. There are no high dramas or epiphanies during her month-long tour, but with each visit May begins to appreciate that friendships must be cultivated and nurtured just like the plants and trees she tends back home. Author Jessica Francis Kane knows just when to layer in literary and botanical references to enhance the story, leaving the reader to meditate not only about friendship and life’s simple pleasures, but also about the costs of human encroachment on the natural world.
