On the fifth of July, RL and June go down to the river with a bottle of Johnnie Walker Red to commemorate Taylor's fiftieth and last birthday. Taylor was RL's boyhood friend and June's husband, but after eleven years, June, a childless hospice worker, finally declares she's 'nobody's widow anymore.' Anxious for a new beginning, June considers selling her beloved house. RL, a divorced empty-nester, faces a major change, too, when he agrees to lodge his college girlfriend, Betsy, while she undergoes chemotherapy. Caught between Betsy's anguish and June's hope, the cynical RL is brought face-to-face with his own sense of futility, and the longing to experience the kind of love that 'knocks you down.'

Online resource; title from ePub title page (Digitalia, viewed March 14, 2018)