[Kobi]

In a country and culture generally obsessed with youth, Zane Kotker offers a welcome antidote with her novella “Goodnight, Ladies.” In her new work, the Northampton novelist, profiles three widowed women who have entered their early 70s and are navigating a strange period in their lives.

Goodnight, Ladies” offers a moving meditation on memory and loss, while also staring down the realities of aging in a matter-of-fact way. As Kotker writes, “Death seems so impossible to the young. To the old it’s as common as spent tea bags.