This Is How It Always Is: A Novel

New York Times Bestseller
The Reese Witherspoon x Hello Sunshine Book Club Pick

Every once in a while, I read a book that opens my eyes in a way I never expected. Reese Witherspoon (Reeses Book Club x Hello Sunshine book pick)

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Pacific Northwest Book Awards Finalist
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Longlisted for 2019 International DUBLIN Literary Award

It made me laugh, it made me cry, it made me think. Liane Moriarty, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Big Little Lies

This is how a family keeps a secretand how that secret ends up keeping them.

This is how a family lives happily ever afteruntil happily ever after becomes complicated.

This is how children changeand then change the world.

This is Claude. Hes five years old, the youngest of five brothers, and loves peanut butter sandwiches. He also loves wearing a dress, and dreams of being a princess.

When he grows up, Claude says, he wants to be a girl.

Rosie and Penn want Claude to be whoever Claude wants to be. Theyre just not sure theyre ready to share that with the world. Soon the entire family is keeping Claudes secret. Until one day it explodes.

Laurie Frankel's This Is How It Always Is is a novel about revelations, transformations, fairy tales, and family. And its about the ways this is how it always is: Change is always hard and miraculous and hard again, parenting is always a leap into the unknown with crossed fingers and full hearts, children grow but not always according to plan. And families with secrets dont get to keep them forever.