Closer to Fine

"Maybe underneath it all, we are all insecure, emotional, and vulnerable. Maybe there isn't some model of who I'm supposed to be or who I'm not. Maybe the important thing is just to be."Shoshana Portnoy's debut novel, Closer to Fine, chronicles five years in the life of Aviva Greenberg, a photography student at a Texas university.As a bisexual, Mexican-American, Jewish woman, Aviva's life is anything but ordinary. While Aviva is starting her marriage, her grandmother Sophie, a widow, is learning to live on her own for the first time in 82 years. As Aviva struggles with her own unhealthy relationship, she finds herself wrestling with the question- is it possible for a woman to maintain her own identity within the confines of marriage. During her quest to answer that question, she is confronted with the tragic circumstances surrounding her ex-girlfriend's murder and learns the truth behind her grandmother's secret life.