Red Whiskey Blues.

New York : Crown Publishers, 1989., 1989. Fine. 279 pp. ; 24 cm. ; 1st edition, 1st printing ; ISBN: 0517559900 :; 9780517559901 LCCN: 88-30158 ; OCLC: 18560572 ; author's second novel ; " Emily, children's author and mother of six-year-old Lizzie, worries her grief and rage through the first year after husband Peter's death. Emily's tenant in her turreted family home on the New Jersey shore is writer Gene, separated from his wife and child, and it's Gene who offers an avuncular love to Lizzie and nagging encouragement to Emily to shape up , leave the past and the dead. In the meantime, Emily's mother, Francine--the elusive mother she sees briefly twice a year--is always traveling, only occasionally dropping a postcard. Francine's husband Tom--lawyer, ice-skater supreme, clarinet play er, and adoring father to Emily--left forever 19 years before, when Francine's absorption in her seriously deformed and brain-damaged second child had torn apart the marriage. Then there were Francine's alcoholism--'I drank every day until Emily was sixteen', a dry-out, and work for a foundation for families of seriously retarded children. Now, suddenly, Francine is off on a misty quest--to find Tom by following a phantom image of her long-lost husband playing in a band--through bars, clubs, a nd even a journey with an aging swing band. Is she doing this for Emily's sake? "--Kirkus Reports ; remainder mark on bottom of text block, else FINE/FINE