Leave it to Doris

After her mother's death, twenty-year-old Doris Artman finds herself suddenly responsible for a minister's household full of younger siblings, a grieving father, and the relentless expectations of their small community. What begins as duty becomes a quiet crisis of identity: Doris is good at managing the house, at keeping everyone fed and clothed and comforted, but somewhere beneath the endless tasks, a younger self still yearns for something she cannot name. Ethel Hueston writes with tender precision about the particular loneliness of being indispensable, the way obligation can substitute for living. This is not a novel of dramatic revelations but of small, accumulated moments a girl recognizes she's been performing maturity so long she's forgotten how to be young. For readers who cherish novels about women navigating the gap between what they're expected to want and what they actually want.