When her elderly mother starts making impulsive choices, Gwen panics – but her mother insists everyone, regardless of age, has the right to choose their own happiness in this new novel by beloved author, Susan Meissner.

San Diego, 1969. As Apollo astronauts prepare to take the first steps on the moon, Gwen is simply trying to hold her world together. A devoted daughter, wife, and mother, she has honored a promise to her deceased father to care for her well-off but fragile and dependent mother, Lucille.

But when a head injury transforms eighty-year-old Lucille into a bold, impulsive woman who brazenly invites a younger, ponytailed opportunist to live with her, Gwen’s grip begins to falter. She can’t believe what her mother is doing, but can she stop her? Meanwhile, her eighteen-year-old daughter, Natalie—reeling from a friend’s death in Vietnam—has gone quiet. Too quiet.

As the moon landing draws near, Gwen must confront the limits of control, the weight of promises, and the terrifying beauty of letting go.