One Minus One

by Ruth Doan MacDougall

Published 1 February 2013

The year is 1969, a time of turmoil for the United States—and for thirty-year-old Emily Bean, who, following her devastating divorce, leaves her home in the New Hampshire mountains to work as a teacher in the state’s coastal region.

Still in love with her ex-husband, David, Emily struggles to adjust to single life. Women’s liberation and the freewheeling sixties had only been on the perimeter of her married life, so even walking into a restaurant alone makes insecure Emily self-conscious.

The men in town are quick to notice an available and attractive young woman with legs made for miniskirts. Emily falls into relationships with two men, one of whom could be her way back to the safe life that she lost.

But in this portrait of a woman on the brink of self-realization, Emily must learn whether or not she can truly recapture the past.