Summer roommates

Chamberlain's ponderous latest (after A Summer Love Affair) follows four women over the course of a summer as they share a house in Maine. Sandra Pennington, recently widowed, hopes to alleviate her loneliness by opening her four-bedroom home to strangers. She hires a real estate agent to vet applicants and selects Mary Frasier, a recently retired New York City lawyer and recovering workaholic; Amanda Irving, a 50-something high-school teacher in Boston debating whether to break up with her boyfriend of eight years; and Patty Porter, a former office assistant who relies on handouts from her sisters. The women get together for dinners every Wednesday night, during which they swap opinions about families, aging, religion, and caregiving. As the months tick by, they grow closer, and each woman weighs their options for a happier life. Chamberlin retreads many of the same scenes from each character's point of view, which feels like padding. She's better in scenes where the women exchange their theories on life (Amanda wonders if "the notion of a maternal instinct was in fact a damaging myth meant to control the lives of women"). Though occasionally thought-provoking, this is fairly humdrum. (July)