I love books about a carefully built life that falls apart, and instead of ending, the story is really just beginning.
Maybe that’s why “starting over” stories are the heart of so much women’s fiction. They remind us that a fresh start rarely looks the way we imagined it — sometimes it looks like going home, sometimes like a stranger’s town, sometimes like the same kitchen with a different heart beating in it. But it’s always possible.
If you love hopeful, character-rich novels about starting over and second chances, here are seven to add to your list.
1. Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman
Eleanor Oliphant is completely fine — at least, that’s what she tells herself. Brilliant, blunt, and wonderfully odd, she lives by careful routines: the same job for nine years, the same simple dinners, the same solitary weekends. Then a chance encounter with Raymond from IT, and a stranger who takes a fall on the sidewalk, quietly begins to crack her carefully ordered world open. Gail Honeyman’s debut had me laughing out loud one moment and aching for Eleanor the next — never laughing at her, but delighting in how she sees the world. Funny, heartbreaking, and ultimately full of hope, this is a story about how connection finds us even when we’ve convinced ourselves we don’t need it. Completely unforgettable.
2. The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin
A.J. Fikry owns Island Books, the only bookstore on Alice Island — and lately, life isn’t going well. He’s grieving the loss of his wife, sales are down, and his most valuable rare book has just been stolen, leaving him crankier and more closed-off by the day. Then one night he finds an unexpected package on the bookshop floor, and everything changes. Gabrielle Zevin fills this jewel of a book with some of the most likeable, memorable characters I’ve met in a long time — including a book-loving cop named Lambiase who might be my favorite of all. A feel-good, gently romantic story that will make you smile (keep a few tissues handy), this one is a love letter to books, bookstores, and the way stories meld our lives together. A must-read for book lovers.
3. The Garden of Small Beginnings by Abbi Waxman
Lili Girvan lost her husband Dan in an instant, and three years later she’s still finding her footing — raising two young daughters with help from her sister Rachel, and settling into a life that’s become safe, routine, and predictable. Then her job hands her an unusual assignment: to illustrate a book on vegetables and flowers, she must first take a six-week gardening class at the Los Angeles Botanical Garden. With Rachel and the girls in tow, Lili starts digging into the dirt — and, of course, far more than the garden begins to grow. Abbi Waxman handles Lili’s grief with honesty, but don’t expect maudlin: this book had me belly-laughing page after page, from a five-year-old painting herself into a ladybug to a dog citing legal precedent over a chicken nugget. A warm, funny story about how planting seeds and sitting in the sun can bring renewal and hope — and how small beginnings can grow into a whole new life. (If you like your grief stories with a garden and a laugh, my post on 7 novels about grief, motherhood, and finding your way back to joy has a few more.)
4. The Blue Bistro by Elin Hilderbrand
Adrienne Dealey has never stayed in one place for long — so when she lands on Nantucket with no plan and no job, a chance meeting with Thatcher Smith, owner of the island’s hottest restaurant, changes everything. Despite zero restaurant experience, she’s hired as assistant manager of The Blue Bistro and thrown headlong into a world of outsized egos, grueling pace, and mouthwatering food (fair warning: the descriptions will make you hungry). As she and Thatcher are drawn to each other, the questions pile up: what is his real relationship with Fiona, his business partner and the bistro’s elusive chef? And why would a restaurant at the top of its game be closing after this season? I could not put this book down — the staff are like a dysfunctional family who love each other despite themselves, the romance is messy and emotional, and Fiona’s story tugged hard at my heartstrings. An early Hilderbrand that makes it clear why she’s at the top of her genre — and it will absolutely have you dreaming of Nantucket.
5. Evvie Drake Starts Over by Linda Holmes
Everyone in Evvie Drake’s small Maine town feels for her — her husband was killed in a car accident just as she was planning to take her life in a new direction, and the whole town assumes she’s devastated. But no one really knows Evvie, or what her marriage was truly like. Some things are simply better left unsaid. Enter Dean: a former star pitcher for the New York Yankees who suddenly, inexplicably, lost the ability to throw a strike and washed out of the game. When Evvie’s best friend suggests she rent Dean the apartment in her house, it just works — because it turns out they both have a lot to hide. There’s nothing cliché about this rom-com: it’s authentic, relatable, and completely real, about two people gradually discovering there’s life after your dreams fall short. Evvie and Dean grabbed my heart and ran with it — my breath actually caught (and I’m not even a romantic at heart!). Linda Holmes has written a captivating, heartwarming book about… well… life. I loved it, and I hope you will too.
6. Summer in the Moon Garden by Kristie Booker
And because this list wouldn’t be honest without it — this is the story I wrote about starting over. When Kat’s twenty-year marriage unravels and her twin sons leave for Alaska for the summer, she does the only thing that makes sense: she goes home to Criss Creek, to familiar streets, close-knit family, and Jess, the best friend who has always known her heart. Together they write a summer bucket list — part rebellion, part healing — to reclaim the pieces of themselves they’ve slowly given away. Then Kat’s first love, Danny, reappears, and she has to decide whether to cling to the familiar or risk everything for the life she still dreams of. It’s a gentle second-chance story — more pining than spice — about friendship, midlife, and the quiet courage it takes to begin again. If you love small towns and hopeful endings, I wrote this one for you. Read the first 3 chapters of Summer in the Moon Garden free here, or meet Kat and the story of her starting over.
7. The Inn at Rose Harbor by Debbie Macomber
Jo Marie Rose arrives in Cedar Cove, Washington seeking peace and a fresh start. A young war widow — her husband Paul was killed serving in Afghanistan — she purchases a local bed-and-breakfast and renames it the Rose Harbor Inn in his honor. From the moment she sees it, she knows this is the place that will help her heal, and if the inn can comfort her, surely it can offer the same refuge to her first two guests. Josh Weaver has come home to care for the ailing stepfather he’s been estranged from for years, with little hope they can reconcile. Abby Kincaid has returned for her brother’s wedding — her first time back in twenty years, in a town that harbors painful memories she’s never let go. I expected a sweet, light, fluffy read, but this story left a lump in my throat the whole way through — in the best way. Filled with healing, friendship, forgiveness, and new beginnings, it’s the first in Debbie Macomber’s Rose Harbor series (a spin-off of her beloved Cedar Cove books), and I was hooked from the very first page. This one will stay stuck in my heart for a long time to come.
Why novels about starting over stay with us
Whatever season of change you’re in — chosen or not — I hope one of these stories keeps you company through it. Starting over is rarely tidy. But in the best books, and in real life, it’s where the good part begins.
If you want more in this vein, my 10 cozy women’s fiction novels that feel like a warm hug overlaps with this list in all the best ways — and the recipes from my novels are here if a book makes you hungry.
P.S. If slow seasons and small joys are your thing too, I make a Simple Joys List every month — twenty little ways to savor the season you’re actually in. Get the September list here.