Get a good book and a free hat.

Join now for $5.

We’ll make this quick.

First, enter your email. Then choose your move.

By pressing "Pick a book now" or "Pick a book later", you agree to Book of the Month’s Terms of use and Privacy policy.

Get a good book and a free hat.

Join now for $5.
undefined

You did it!

Your account is now up to date.

get the appget the app

Our app is where it’s at.

Unlock our Reading Challenge, earn prizes, and get notified of new books on our app.

Our app is where it’s at.

Unlock our Reading Challenge, earn prizes, and get notified of new books on our app.

Download on the App Store
Get it on Google Play

Already have the app? Explore here.

Where’d You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple

Contemporary fiction

Where’d You Go, Bernadette

by Maria Semple

Excellent choice

Just enter your email to add this book to your box.

By pressing "Add to box", you agree to Book of the Month’s Terms of use and Privacy policy.

Volume 0
Volume 0

A free gift for you.

Yes, she’s embroidered. Add her to your first box.

No thanks, just checkout

Quick take

A wacky mother-daughter tale that shifts between hilarious and heart-wrenching.

Good to know

  • Illustrated icon, Quirky

    Quirky

  • Illustrated icon, Puzzle

    Puzzle

  • Illustrated icon, Buzzy

    Buzzy

  • Illustrated icon, Now_a_Movie

    Now a movie

Synopsis

Bernadette Fox is notorious. To her Microsoft-guru husband, she’s a fearlessly opinionated partner; to fellow private-school mothers in Seattle, she’s a disgrace; to design mavens, she’s a revolutionary architect; and to 15-year-old Bee, she is her best friend and, simply, Mom.

Then Bernadette vanishes. It all began when Bee aced her report card and claimed her promised reward: a family trip to Antarctica. But Bernadette’s intensifying allergy to Seattle—and people in general—has made her so agoraphobic that a virtual assistant in India now runs her most basic errands. A trip to the end of the earth is problematic.

To find her mother, Bee compiles email messages, official documents, and secret correspondence—creating a compulsively readable and surprisingly touching novel about misplaced genius and a mother and daughter’s role in an absurd world.

Member ratings (4,408)

Now a movie
Pieces of Her
Death on the Nile
Practical Magic
The Goldfinch
All the Bright Places
Saving Zoë
Normal People
Where’d You Go, Bernadette
Nine Perfect Strangers
Little Fires Everywhere
Dark Places
Now a movie
View all
Pieces of Her
Death on the Nile
Practical Magic
The Goldfinch
All the Bright Places
Saving Zoë
Normal People
Where’d You Go, Bernadette
Nine Perfect Strangers
Little Fires Everywhere
Dark Places