The Next : A Novel of Love, Revenge and a Ghost Who Can't Let Go

"Love and loss, revenge and redemption, this debut novel will stick with you for a long time." --Emily Giffin "I love The Next ...elegantly written, thoughtfully sharp, surprisingly touching." --Cathleen Schine Is there a right way to die? If so, Joanna DeAngelis has it all wrong. She's consumed by betrayal, spending her numbered days obsessing over Ned McGowan, her much younger ex, and watching him thrive in the spotlight with someone new, while she wastes away. She's every woman scorned, fantasizing about revenge ... except she's out of time. Joanna falls from her life, from the love of her daughters and devoted dog, into an otherworldly landscape, a bleak infinity she can't escape until she rises up and returns and sets it right--makes Ned pay--so she can truly move on. From the other side into right this minute, Jo embarks on a sexy, spiritual odyssey. As she travels beyond memory, beyond desire, she is transformed into a fierce female force of life, determined to know how to die, happily ever after Joanna DeAngelis may be gone from this life, but she has a score to settle before she can move on to the next. Abandoned by Ned McGowan, her younger lover, and obsessed with his betrayal, Joanna falls into a dark afterlife, only to rise up as a restless, vengeful spirit. Anna and Elena, her loving daughters, grapple with grief. Her faithful dog, Tom, watches and waits. But Joanna has only one thing on her agenda: revenge. She streaks through contemporary Manhattan, chasing Ned down, determined to hold him accountable for leaving her alone in her darkest hour. Along the way, Joanna revisits the beautiful life she once had, the choices she made and the consequences she suffered. She is transported by memory into desire and even deeper, into her very soul, where she searches for what's been lost ... and finds what is eternal. At the end of her journey, none of them - Jo's daughters, her dog, Ned and the ghost Joanna - will ever be the same. Fierce and funny, dark and uplifting, a sexy, lyrical page-turner, The Next is at its heart, a love story about a ghost who is determined to fix her life, even after she's dead.

"Love and loss, revenge and redemption, this debut novel will stick with you for a long time." —Emily Giffin

"I love The Next...elegantly written, thoughtfully sharp, surprisingly touching." —Cathleen Schine

Is there a right way to die? If so, Joanna DeAngelis has it all wrong. She’s consumed by betrayal, spending her numbered days obsessing over Ned McGowan, her much younger ex, and watching him thrive in the spotlight with someone new, while she wastes away. She’s every woman scorned, fantasizing about revenge ... except she’s out of time.

Joanna falls from her life, from the love of her daughters and devoted dog, into an otherworldly landscape, a bleak infinity she can’t escape until she rises up and returns and sets it right—makes Ned pay—so she can truly move on.

From the other side into right this minute, Jo embarks on a sexy, spiritual odyssey. As she travels beyond memory, beyond desire, she is transformed into a fierce female force of life, determined to know how to die, happily ever after.

In life, Joanna turned away from the loved ones she believed disappointed her. After succumbing to breast cancer, she becomes a ghost bent on revenge against her much younger ex, and can't move on from a bleak infinity until she makes Ned pay. As she embarks on a sexy, spiritual odyssey and travels beyond desire, Jo is eventually forced to reevaluate her life choices and the qualities of a proper death Turning away from the loved ones she believes disappointed her before succumbing to breast cancer, Joanna DeAngelis becomes a ghost bent on revenge against her ex and is eventually forced to reevaluate her life choices and the qualities of a proper death.