Life hasn’t turned out quite the way Becca Cammeyer of Greenwich Village – once voted most likely to land on Broadway or in jail for a good cause – had planned. Her only child has moved to another continent, she’s still living in a fifth-floor walkup with her aging dog, still single, still nearly broke, still not on speaking terms with her best friend or mother, and still hearing the ghost of her long-dead father whispering in her ear. But she’s a semi-famous tour guide, and on a perfect October evening, Becca almost believes all is well with her world as she helps a group of South Carolinian tourists fall in love with her beloved Village. The tour concludes, and Becca sends the women on their way, unaware that her world is about to be upended. In the aftermath of a tragedy, Becca must come to terms with her own paralysis, her survivor’s guilt, and the messiness of her life. She embarks on wildly improbable reconciliations and new relationships. At once a love story about Greenwich Village and a reflection on a changing world, Save the Village reveals how when a community comes together, everyone wins.
Praise for Save the Village
“Save the Village is the kind of love letter the world’s most famous neighborhood deserves, written with the intimate detail and wry affection only a loving insider could conjure.”
– John Strausbaugh, author of The Village
“Michele Herman knows Greenwich Village inside out: its gestures, its codes, the complex history behind each building facade, smile, or frown. Every village is a universe, and Herman brings this one joyously alive. With compassion and humor, she tells a gripping tale of a rupture that shakes a community into a new alignment.”
– Pamela Erens, author of Matasha, Eleven Hours, and The Virgins
“Michele Herman has created a protagonist worthy of Grace Paley, and rendered her world with such intimacy you may think that you, too, once inhabited it. Save The Village is a paean to the energy and idiosyncrasies of New York City, and to those, who, against all odds, have staked their claim there.”
– Sue Halpern, staff writer, The New Yorker
