Rachel Hauck. The Fifth Avenue Story Society. Nelson, 2020.

The reader may begin by saying, I’ve read or watched something like this before. The five main characters each receive an invitation to the Fifth Avenue Story Society which meets Monday nights at a famous private library in New York City. The invitations have no return address, there is no sign of who sent them. Isn’t this like an Agatha Cristie story or maybe Twelve Days at Bleakly Manor?

Unlike Ten Little Indians, no one gets murdered. Unlike Bleakly Manor, no one is trying to drive people away. There are only five people at the Story Society meeting, each with a similar invitation. There may be some method to the madness—two of the invitees are a divorced couple. The paths of two of the men had crossed briefly, but other than that, the setup appears random.

Lexa is the assistant to the CEO of a fast-rising fast food chain. She knows the ins and outs of the company better than anyone and is gunning for a promotion. She is recently divorced from Jett, an English professor at New York College (a stand-in for NYU) about to help the college by getting a large grant from the estate of a best-selling author Jett specializes in.

Chuck is a divorced Uber driver. He used to be prosperous, but since his divorce, he lost everything and even has a restraining order to keep him from his two children, a twin boy and girl.

Ed is retired. He still carries a torch for his wife who died over thirty years ago and hopes to write a book about their idyllic love. His one daughter is married with children and lives in a nice house on Long Island, but he prefers to live in the same apartment he shared with Esmerelda for the eight years they were married.

Coral is the CEO of a famous cosmetics firm started by her great-grandmother in the 1920s. Her recent life has been something of a roller coaster. She was engaged to a European prince (Grace Kelly or Meghan Markle?) but got cold feet at the last minute. In other words, she has turned into big tabloid fodder. Meanwhile, her latest cosmetic line seems to be mired in red ink.

We meet Chuck and Jett before the invitations are sent. At a wedding reception, they defend one of the bridesmaids from an overaggressive groomsman. It turns into a melee, and they end up spending the night together in a jail cell.

Everyone in the Story Society is hurting. Each one has a secret they fear revealing. Yet they all meet every week for a few months because, frankly, they all are a bit lonely and have been spurned for one reason or another. Unlike the other tales mentioned at the beginning, they all seem to get along. Even Jett and Lexa still respect each other.

As the stories unwind, we discover there are many secrets. In that sense there are mysteries. Jett and Lexa seemed happily married until Jett’s brother died in a paragliding accident and Jett just withdrew. Lexa, meanwhile, was working long and hard to please her boss who seemed to merely take her for granted.

The family that owned the mansion where the library is located were friends of the gilded age author who is Jett’s specialty. There are rumors that Gordon Phipps Roth plagiarized some of his works, but there is no evidence, and he has been dead for a hundred years. There is one reason the Roth family is giving NYC a huge endowment: Jett appears to have proven that Roth indeed did his own work.

And why does Ed say every week that he wants to write about Esmerelda but never does? Why did Coral break off her royal wedding? Why is Chuck so restless and bitter?

The Fifth Avenue Story Society tells a clever yarn as these different tales and the people behind them begin to unravel. And Gilda—the quiet librarian who ushers the society members in and out of their weekly meetings—does she have anything to do with anything?

While The Fifth Avenue Story Society is hardly chick lit, it is presented as a romance and packaged in a way that the publisher presents its romances. As I read it, I did not have that sense of a packaged romance at all. Having said that, there is an epilogue, a short chapter that was probably not necessary but might tie some loose ends for readers looking for them. I could not help thinking of some of Shakespeare’s romances like Twelfth Night, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and (especially) the aptly named As You Like It. What do they all have in common? That’s my secret.