Cory’s Feast

Cory is a middle-aged Easterner, long-divorced, ener­getic and fear­lessly sen­sual. Pursuing a dream she has nursed for years, she moves to Taos, New Mexico and buys a famous old house and, in the tra­di­tion of its pre­vi­ous owner, turns it into a cru­cible for the trans­for­ma­tion of her guests. Eccentric and charm­ing, with a lover from the Pueblo and lots of turquoise and broom­stick skirts, Cory finds her guests, mainly skiers and tourists, bewil­dered by her par­tic­u­lar phi­los­o­phy, which she calls “The School of As-If.”

Then her long-time friend is found mur­dered and Cory is sus­pi­cious of the local police’s half-hearted attempts to find the mur­derer. Involving her­self in try­ing to solve the case, her unleashed power leads to sur­pris­ing and even ter­ri­fy­ing results.

Part mur­der mys­tery, part adven­ture, this ground-breaking novel traces the mature lives of Cory and her much more con­ven­tional sis­ter Apple, who first appeared in the author’s Matron of Honor, described by Publishers Weekly as “A pow­er­ful novel, her best yet.”

View all of Sallie's online writing in her archives.