If You Could See What I See

A widow finds solace working in her family’s lingerie shop in this heartwarming novel by the author of A Different Kind of Normal.

For decades, the women in Meggie O'Rourke’s family have run Lace, Satin, and Baubles, a lingerie business that specializes in creations as exquisitely pretty as they are practical. The dynamic in Meggie’s family, however, is perpetually dysfunctional. In fact, if Meggie weren’t being summoned back to Portland, Oregon, by her grandmother, she’d be inclined to stay away all together.

Since her husband’s death a year ago, Meggie’s emotions have been in constant flux, and so has her career as a documentary filmmaker. Finding ways to keep the family business afloat—and dealing with her squabbling sister and cousin—will at least give her a temporary focus. To draw customers to their website, Meggie decides to interview relatives and employees about their first bras and favorite lingerie. She envisions something flip and funny, but the confessions that emerge are unexpectedly poignant. There are stories of first loves and aching regrets, passionate mistakes and surprising rendezvous. And as the revelations illuminate her family’s past, Meggie begins to find her own way forward.

With warmth and unflinching humor, If You Could See What I See explores the tender truths we keep close—and what can happen when we find the courage to bare them to the world.

Praise for Cathy Lamb

“This finely pitched family melodrama is balanced with enough gallows humor and idiosyncratic characters to make it positively irresistible.” —Publishers Weekly on Henry’s Sisters