The Ex-Debutante - Hardcover

Carlisle Wainwright Cushing, of the old-moneyed Willow Creek, Texas, Wainwrights, is the daughter of larger-than-life Ridgely Wainwright . . . Cushing-Jameson-Lackley-Harper-Ogden.  Given her mother’s predilection for divorce, no one is surprised that Carlisle becomes a divorce lawyer and runs far away to Boston, where no one, including her fiancé, knows she’s an heiress.  But now, three years later, Carlisle is lured back to Texas to deal with her mother’s latest divorce and the family-sponsored 100th annual debutante ball which is on the verge of collapse. 

Suddenly the determined lawyer is weighing the merits of beads versus crystals on ball gowns and teaching eighteen-year-olds to balance books on their heads, all the while trying to figure out how to tell her deeply Southern mother that she is engaged to a Yankee.  Things go from bad to worse and soon Carlisle's afraid she’ll never get back to Boston, especially when good ol’ Southern boy Jack Blair shows up on the opposite side of the divorce court, making her wonder if the man is going after her mother in the proceedings, or her. 

Carlisle's trip home challenges her sense of who she really is and forces her to face the secrets her family has tried to keep, well, secret.  Funny and smart, poignant and true, The Ex-Debutante is a story about the risks one woman must take if she stands a chance of finding herself, real love, and her place in that crazy thing we call family.

“I adored The Ex-Debutante and seriously read it in one don't-interrupt-me-on-penalty-of-death sitting.  Linda's voice is so lively and vibrant and fun—and the story was completely compelling.”
–Beth Harbison, bestselling author of Shoe Addicts Anonymous

“Original with fresh sparks of wit...Lee offers a story about the importance of family, unconditional love and looking beyond the false surface of perfection.
–Patti Callahan Henry, bestselling author of Between the Tides

“The Ex-Debutante is fun, witty and totally fabulous.”
–Rachel Gibson, New York Times bestselling author of Tangled Up in You

"Linda Francis Lee serves up heaps of delicious bon mits to split your sides.  Thsi is one debutante ball to which you'll want to show up unfashionably early so as not to miss a singel page."
–Saira Rao, author of The Chambermaid