Thursday, March 28, 2013

Review: The Paradise Guest House by Ellen Sussman

There's that old cliche about getting right back up on the horse after you fall off and surprisingly, it really does work on many things. But could you do it when the thing that you need to overcome is not small but truly horrible and terrifying, not just something you've built up to be scary in your own mind? What kind of bravery would it take then? For the main character in Ellen Sussman's novel The Paradise Guest House, the things she has to face are awful, shattering and beyond the normal ken but she is determined to face the demons that continue to haunt her and to heal.

Jamie Hyde is guide for an adventure travel company out of San Francisco. She climbs mountains, shoots rapids, and goes wherever traveling adreneline junkies want to be. She has few emotional ties aside from her dying boss, best friend Larson and she actively avoids the entanglements of heart and hearth. She was in Bali researching potential trips for the company when her world exploded in the blink of an eye in the 2002 nightclub bombings. As a survivor, her body has healed but she is still filled with guilt and grief and horror about the events of that terrible night. So just one year later, she is back in Bali for a healing ceremony arranged for both survivors and victims' families. She's come to not only face the horrors of that night, as she has explained to everyone who has asked, but also on a more private quest to find the stranger who saved her life and whom she cannot get out of her mind.

Jamie's host in Bali at the Paradise Guest House is Nyoman, a gentle Balinese man whose wife was a waitress at one of the clubs. If anyone can understand some of her sorrow and pain, he can. As Bali and the people there work to ease her guilt and grief, she starts her search for Gabe, an American ex-pat living in Bali after his own personal tragedy, the man who saved her life that fateful night but who she has only the scantest of information on: first name and occupation.  What Jamie's final outcome will be, if she will find acceptance and make peace with what happened both in the nightclub that night and with Gabe in the aftermath of the bombing, will depend greatly on his reception of her and on her ability to forgive herself. Jamie is on a journey, courageous and struggling, but her strength of spirit shines through, even despite her guilt and deep sadness.

The novel starts in 2003 but moves back to 2002 and the bombing and its immediate aftermath, before coming back to 2003 and Jamie's emotional quest. This allows the additional reasons behind Jamie's survivor's guilt over the bombing to be revealed slowly and effectively to the reader. It also allows the reader to get a sense of Gabe's motives for rushing into the burning building to save as many as he can before it collapses completely. And it explains why these two souls, so hurt and damaged even before the bombings, would cling to each other as to life rafts in the face of a world seemingly rent asunder in those days immediately following the arrival of terror on an island previously known for its paradise.

Sussman has written a beautiful travel novel, a gentle romance, and a quiet homage to the innocent place where a terrible event rocked the world. Touching on not only the famed beauty and spirituality of Bali, Sussman has also drawn a lovely picture of the people who live there, from Nyoman, grieving his wife and unborn child; to wily street child Bambang and his loyal dog; from Dewi, Nyoman's rebellious yet endearing niece; to Wayan, the local doctor who treated her after the bombing and who feels righteous anger over the second class treatment of the Balinese injured. She's portrayed the culture as welcoming and thoughtful, anxious for healing and moving forward. Jamie as a main character was complex and her baby steps toward opening herself up to the possibility of living and loving made her very appealing to read about. Gabe was a sympathetic character as well and together their confusion and hurt over the past as they explored their needs for the future, together or separately, was well handled. Their bonding after the nightmare quality of what they experienced together was understandable and very emotional but their connection the following year was perhaps a bit rushed. In the end though, the search for connection and the opening up to love and life was done beautifully and respectfully and the end of the story was spot on. The book was touching, serene, and a pleasure to read.

For more information about Ellen Sussman and the book check out her website, follow her on Facebook or Twitter. Follow the rest of the blog tour or look at the amazon reviews for others' thoughts and opinions on the book.

Thanks to Lisa from TLC Book Tours and the publisher for sending me a copy of this book to review.

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme is hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on.

Palisades Park by Alan Brennert. The book is being released by St. Martin's Press on April 9, 2013.

Amazon says this about the book: Growing up in the 1930s, there is no more magical place than Palisades Amusement Park in New Jersey—especially for seven-year-old Antoinette, who horrifies her mother by insisting on the unladylike nickname Toni, and her brother, Jack. Toni helps her parents, Eddie and Adele Stopka, at the stand where they sell homemade French fries amid the roar of the Cyclone roller coaster. There is also the lure of the world’s biggest salt-water pool, complete with divers whose astonishing stunts inspire Toni, despite her mother's insistence that girls can't be high divers.

But a family of dreamers doesn't always share the same dreams, and then the world intrudes: There's the Great Depression, and Pearl Harbor, which hits home in ways that will split the family apart; and perils like fire and race riots in the park. Both Eddie and Jack face the dangers of war, while Adele has ambitions of her own—and Toni is determined to take on a very different kind of danger in impossible feats as a high diver. Yet they are all drawn back to each other—and to Palisades Park—until the park closes forever in 1971.

Evocative and moving, with the trademark brilliance at transforming historical events into irresistible fiction that made Alan Brennert’s Moloka'i and Honolulu into reading group favorites, Palisades Park takes us back to a time when life seemed simpler—except, of course, it wasn't.

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Review: The End of the Point by Elizabeth Graver

Sometimes a place is so very much a part of who you are that it is home in a way that even your actual home isn't. I certainly have a place like that in my life. It is a place where I can be most myself, unguarded, a place that heals me and supports me, and is so deeply ingrained in my very marrow that I cannot separate it from myself. It changes incrementally over the years and yet somehow stays the same. Ashaunt Point and the Porter's summer home is that kind of place to several generations in Elizabeth Graver's quietly elegant novel, The End of the Point.

Told in several distinct sections spanning almost 50 years in the Porter family's lives, the novel opens with their arrival for the summer of 1942 with teenaged daughters Helen and Dossy, younger daughter Janie, Scottish nannies Bea and Agnes, but without son Charlie who is in Texas away training for the war. The Point is much changed this summer of '42 though as the government has taken over a stretch of it and has soldiers training there. The presence of the soldiers draws Helen and Dossy, who have been left to run wild, as well as nanny Bea, who experiences first love at the age of thirty-seven, and leads to the incident that causes the Porters to leave their refuge early that summer. But this first section of the book introduces most of the major characters in the novel and exposes their complexly intricate relationships with each other. Amongst others, there's Bea's maternal love for her charge Janie and her vague dislike of Helen and there's Mrs. P. who, despite not being terrible involved in her daughters' lives, casts a long shadow. The distant war come home to roost and the way it has both accelerated life and slowed time to a crawl always hovers just on the edge of the narrative as well.

Jumping in time from that summer with its loss of innocence to Helen's letters home from school in Switzerland only five years further on and then her diaries some fifteen years after the war as she comes again to Ashaunt as a young mother struggling with her feelings of being trapped and stagnant in motherhood and wanting so much the life of an intellectual. The Point bears mute witness to her desperate search for self and how she invests so much in her golden child, oldest son Charlie. Then the summer compound hosts this lost and searching son Charlie in the early seventies as he hibernates from the world after an LSD trip leaves him fighting its enduring and crippling effects. As he tries to hold onto himself and keep from flying apart from within the safety of his childhood cabin retreat, he watches a world torn apart and bleeding in the face of Vietnam, illegal drugs, and the desecration of development. And finally, in the last section of the novel, the narrative comes back to Helen, now an old woman facing her mortality. Although she might have stayed away in the intervening years, discontented and unsettled, in the end, she seeks the enduring sanctuary and peace of Ashaunt Point as she herself comes to the end.

The writing here is measured and slow, reflecting the timelessness of the place within the novel and in fact the very story itself. The world outside of Ashaunt Point is changing but despite the ways in which these changes do press in on the rocky peninsula, there is still a changeless, comforting feel to the natural world and long-time residents of the point. The plot is very much character driven, internal and introspective, and each generation slides seamlessly into the subtly annual picture taken at the cottage. This is an unexpectedly seductive tale, beautifully written with each succeeding generation another wave upon the shore of the place. The characters are alternately remote and confiding depending on their individual personalities. And the impact of the greater family, the casual and quiet emotional connections, is moving and true and beautiful. A novel of belonging, family, and home, where resides the place of your heart, this is a masterful and affecting novel, effortlessly literary, spare, and elegant all at once.

For more information about Elizabeth Graver and the book check out her website, follow her on Facebook or Twitter. Follow the rest of the blog tour or look at the amazon reviews for others' thoughts and opinions on the book.

Thanks to Trish from TLC Book Tours and the publisher for sending me a copy of this book to review.

Monday, March 25, 2013

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

The spring is always a busy time for me and this spring is no different. I might actually have figured out a decent balance between the craziness of activities and the solitude of reading this past week though. There were still the usual dance classes, soccer practices, and tennis matches in addition to the visit of a cousin I haven't seen in a decade but I still found time to suit my introverted self and enjoy some wonderful reads as well as post more than a few reviews. A good week all around! This meme is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.

Books I completed this past week are:

Heart Like Mine by Amy Hatvany
The End of the Point by Elizabeth Graver
The Paradise Guest House by Ellen Sussman
Vaclav and Lena by Haley Tanner

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

Better Than Fiction edited by Don George
Sacred Hearts by Sarah Dunant

Reviews posted this week:

Capital of the World by Charlene Mires
The Missing Manuscript of Jane Austen by Syrie James
Heart Like Mine by Amy Hatvany
The Lass Wore Black by Karen Ranney
Gonzalez and Daughter Trucking Co. by Maria Amparo Escandon

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

The Paradise Guest House by Ellen Sussman
Vaclav and Lena by Haley Tanner

Sunday, March 24, 2013

Sunday Salon: Rainy days

Today is a filthy, rainy day. My backyard is a bog, the creek behind the house is running muddy and at the tops of its banks, and the mail we inadvertantly left in the mailbox yesterday was sodden this morning. Tennis and soccer for today have already been cancelled. But as complicated as the rain can make my life with rescheduled activities and the impossibility of mowing the lawn before it gets high enough to swallow a small child, sometimes it's not bad to wake up to a grey, rainy day. Not as if I have ever needed an excuse to putz around with my books, but this is a ready made one if there ever was. I can sit down and finish one of the many books I have bookmarks in the middle of right now, I can write a review or two or three, I can rearrange my shelves now that the kids' toys have been thinned out and made more room for my books, I can tidy up the mess we made going through books to donate, I can actually shelve the books sitting on the floor in stacks. There's just so many rainy day book activities to choose from, it almost makes me giddy and I don't know where to start.

I have had a rather busy non-book week but have still managed to escape into my stories some of the time. This week my book travels took me into a blended family grappling with a terrible loss and the unexpected life changes that loss causes, to a summer home on a rocky point in Massachusetts as the times change it and the extended family to whom it belongs, and to Bali with a woman wrestling with being a survivor of the 2002 nightclub bombings there. Where did your bookish travels take you?

Saturday, March 23, 2013

Review: Gonzalez and Daughter Trucking Co. by Maria Amparo Escandon

Libertad, an American citizen, is incarcerated in a Mexican women’s prison for a crime that she is unable to articulate to the other inmates. What she can and does do, is to start a Library Club within the prison where she ostensibly reads to the inmates. But she’s not reading the battered books she holds in her hands. She is telling the life story of a girl, who has lived her whole life on the road with her former professor turned Mexican fugitive trucker father, complete with embellishments, obfuscations, and straight narrative. The stories of Libertad and Gonzalez’s daughter intertwine, wrapping around each other as past and present mix. The fabricated (or is it?) story of Mudflap Girl (the handle Gonzalez’s daughter adopts) moves by fits and starts to meet up with the story of Libertad in prison telling the story. The story moves in installments, leaving the listeners in the prison and the reader outside the book wondering what happens next, a cliff-hanger technique Libertad claims to have learned from watching soap operas. Meanwhile, Libertad’s daily life in prison is also explored. Life in a Mexican women’s prison comes across as quite different from any other country. There are different classes of prisoners and different levels of privilege, the lines of which Libertad easily crosses as a storyteller.

The cover copy on this novel mentions magical realism but I didn’t find that at all here. What I did find was a delightful meta-story with a subtly done theme of women’s friendship woven through it that completely engaged me as a reader.  The story of Mudflap Girl is a coming of age tale while the narrative thread with Libertad in the women's prison is about storytelling and the freedom to own ourselves within a greater social framework.  The young girl who grows up in the cab of her father's truck, the mascot of many but without real friends of her own becomes, through her time leading the Library Club at the prison, an adult with meaningful friendships and connected, caring familial relationships.  And in both stories, what Libertad relates is a tale of community, first of the trucking community and then of the diverse mishmash of women incarcerated in this Mexican prison.  Both stories weave together throughout the novel, intricately twined together, explaining and embellishing each others' plot line.  While the idea of female empowerment shines through Libertad's storytelling, both in Mudflap Girl's story and in the stories of the different women in the prison, men don't come off very well, causing an unsettling imbalance.  But the created community of the prison, a family both by circumstance and choice, is an appealing refuge to an otherwise rootless woman and makes for an enchanting read.  Definitely unusual, this was a quick read that keeps the reader turning the pages to find out the fate of Mudflap Girl, Libertad's crime, and the way that each and every character's story unfolds.  Ultimately a redemptive story, it will leave the reader with a warm feeling and an appreciation for the Sheherazades among us who lighten our sorrows with their skilled storytelling.

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Review: The Lass Wore Black by Karen Ranney

Beauty and the Beast. We all know it from th Disney movie, right? And it's a familiar trope in romances. A beautiful woman can see past appearances to rescue the hidden away heart of a disfigured man. But what happens when it's the woman who is disfigured, a woman who was formerly so beautiful that her selfishness and bad/improper behaviour was excused because she had the looks of an angel? In Karen Ranney's newest historical romance, The Lass Wore Black, this is exactly the premise.

Catriona Cameron was used to being the most beautiful woman in the room. She hid her less than innocent past and her selfishness behind her beauty and was being courted by a Duke when she was in a horrific carriage accident that left her badly permanently scarred and limping. After she recovers from her physical injuries, she still carries emotional scars so deep that she may never recover, donning a thick lace veil, becoming a complete hermit in the gilded cage of her rooms, and even shunning food. So her aunt Dina enlists the services of an Edinburgh doctor to try and reach the decent and caring Catriona she was just starting to uncover and whom she knows is still inside the damaged shell. But because of Catriona's understandable dislike of doctors, Dr. Mark Thorburn will have to masquerade as a footman to get close to Catriona, to help her to accept her new reality, and to bring her back to life.

Mark Thorburn is not only not a footman, he is actually the grandson of an Earl and will one day inherit the title himself. But he is uncomfortable with his class' tendency to rest on their inherited wealth and so he's pursued his career as a doctor, finding an affinity for the profession and a passion for healing.  He treats not only the monied class but also donates his time to the underserved and desperately poverty stricken who live in the slums of Old Town Edinburgh.  Although she is not one of his deserving charity cases, he is fascinated by Catriona's case and in fact by the woman herself. As he pretends to be Catriona's new, stubborn footman, he enjoys sparring with her and watching her become a more introspective, caring person, less appearance driven, and more outwardly focused. Catriona is as attracted to her handsome footman as he is to her but they have secrets and issues to overcome before they can possibly find happiness. And in addition to the truth of Mark's identity and Catriona's need to move beyond her fear of exposing her appearance to others, an old acquaintance will reappear, hellbent on destruction and revenge, threatening Mark and Catriona's relationship before it even has a chance.

The characters of Mark and Catriona are interesting, quite different than the usual romance hero and heroine. And while Catriona has already been described as being very in touch with her sexuality and her desires, promiscuous even, definitely unusual for the time period given her unmarried state, she and Mark are drawn to each other very quickly and completely and yet it is hard to understand why.  She's a brat and snotty to him when they first meet, hardly an aphrodisiac, although she does mature some as the book goes on, becoming less of a selfish and spoiled character and that helps make her character more appealing than she starts out. The revenge plot line is far fetched and less engaging than that of Catriona realizing that others live so much less well than she does and that her ruined looks are really a superficial concern. Coming into her own as a decent and compassionate person, worthy of the good doctor, is far more interesting than any demented madman storyline. But the theme of revealing one's true self, either because of a well-intentioned ruse or because the actions of the past have obscured it, is an interesting one and handled surprisingly here. The sexual tension between the lead characters may not be as thick or convincing as in many romances but the uniqueness of turning the Beauty and the Beast trope on its head will happily engage most historical romance readers even without it.

For more information about Karen Ranney and the book check out her website, follow her on Facebook or Twitter. Follow the rest of the blog tour or look at the amazon reviews for others' thoughts and opinions on the book.

Thanks to Trish from TLC Book Tours and the publisher for sending me a copy of this book to review.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Review: Heart Like Mine by Amy Hatvany

Life rarely goes as planned. In my house we are fond of saying "the best laid plans of mice and men..." as we try to roll with whatever life has handed out, good, bad, or indifferent. But sometimes what life hands out is so overwhelming that you just don't know how to get through it other than to put your head down and push even while you second guess yourself and consider running away. In Amy Hatvany's newest novel, Heart Like Mine, Grace McAllister is hit with one of life's huge curveballs and not only she, but every character in the novel, will have to adjust to the unexpected and unwanted for a chance to build a new, very different, but ultimately happy life and family.

Director of a non-profit dedicated to getting abused women back on their feet, Grace has never wanted children. She helped raise her younger brother, is a caretaker in her work life, and has never longed for kids of her own. But when she meets and falls in love with good-looking, restauranteur Victor Hansen, she figures that she can be step-mother to his teenaged daughter and young son, especially since the kids live with his ex-wife Kelli. But just days after Grace and Victor get engaged, Kelli dies suddenly and unexpectedly, throwing their future and lives into turmoil. Suddenly, non-maternal Grace is at the center of a ready-made, full-time family and she has to step up to support children grieving the loss of their mother and resentful of her presence or decide that this isn't the life she signed on for and walk away. Victor can't be around for his kids as much as he'd like because the restaurant demands so much of him to stay successful but he and Grace clash over ways to parent his children, especially when Ava pits her father against her soon to be stepmother, adding more tension into an already fraught situation. And Ava, on the cusp of becoming a young woman, resents and needs Grace, alternately pushing her away out of loyalty to Kelli and clinging to her for emotional support and the understanding that only a mother or woman can provide. As they all try to come to an understanding of why Kelli died, long-held secrets from her past start to surface and help to explain more of her character to both Ava and Grace and help them come to an understanding of the person she was.

Grace and Ava and Kelli are all the focus of a third person omniscient narrator here; Grace and Ava's perspectives are presented both in the present and the past, filling in their backstories, and in the chapters focused on Kelli, her past is explored. This technique gives the reader a way to know Grace and Ava's histories and see why they react the ways they do to Kelli's death and to understand what was going on in Kelli's head just before she died. Hatvany has done a good job capturing the mercurial grief of a teenager and the ways in which blended families face stressors that intact families can't imagine, especially when complicated by the loss of one parent. Ava is immature and realistic as a budding teenager, filled with rage and grief and confusion, pushing Grace away even as she needs the reassurance that Grace is there for her if she needs her. Grace hersef is floundering in a role she never chose and which has changed her life beyond recognition. She is so caught up in processing the fact that she's been thrust into parenting that she can't recognize the fact that her compassion and caring at work will directly translate to dealing with Ava and Max. Her frustration, hurt, and betrayal in the early days after Kelli's death as she and Victor not only figure out their changed relationship but also how Grace fits into the kids' lives now that they all live together is definitely authentic feeling although perhaps not explored as fully as it might be as the mystery of Kelli's past picks up steam.

Heart Like Mine is very much a book about relationships, those we choose and those we don't and about the ways in which we adapt and change our relationships when life warrants. It is a quick read and the main characters are sympathetic and realistic. The mystery behind Kelli's long estrangement from her parents is easily guessed and the resolution between Grace and Ava is too easy and quick given the difficult emotions that preceeded it and the reality of life in a blended family. This accelerated pacing towards the end of the book, as the reason behind Kelli's despair is uncovered and the question of whether or not she took too many pills on purpose is revealed (but only to the reader, not to the characters), is a flaw but not one that will put off most readers. Hatvany tackles current social issues carefully and women's fiction fans will appreciate this tale of motherhood, relationship, family, and loss.

Thanks to the publisher for sending me a copy of this book to review.

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme is hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on.

Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline. The book is being released by William Morrow Paperbacks on April 2, 2013.

Amazon says this about the book: Orphan Train is a gripping story of friendship and second chances from Christina Baker Kline, author of Bird in Hand and The Way Life Should Be.

Penobscot Indian Molly Ayer is close to “aging out” out of the foster care system. A community service position helping an elderly woman clean out her home is the only thing keeping Molly out of juvie and worse...

As she helps Vivian sort through her possessions and memories, Molly learns that she and Vivian aren’t as different as they seem to be. A young Irish immigrant orphaned in New York City, Vivian was put on a train to the Midwest with hundreds of other children whose destinies would be determined by luck and chance.

Molly discovers that she has the power to help Vivian find answers to mysteries that have haunted her for her entire life – answers that will ultimately free them both.

Rich in detail and epic in scope, Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline is a powerful novel of upheaval and resilience, of unexpected friendship, and of the secrets we carry that keep us from finding out who we are.

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Review: The Missing Manuscript of Jane Austen by Syrie James

I do love stories where previously undiscovered manuscripts come to light. Because I know my own bookshelves backwards and forwards (and have moved them and unpacked them many times), I know them too well to ever think for a minute that there could be some hidden gem lurking there waiting to be shown to the world. But I don't imagine everyone with bookshelves, especially those in old, inherited homes, is as hands on with their books and particular about their organization as to know everything that sits on those shelves. And the possibilities of attics? Well, that's just beyond exciting when I think in terms of some masterpiece tucked away in a trunk or a crevice. And if the newly found manuscript was written by Jane Austen? Well, that would just be icing on the cake. It would appear that I am not the only one who thinks a find like this is exciting to think about and rife with wondrous potential because Syrie James' novel, The Missing Manuscript of Jane Austen, relies on just such a plot.

Samantha McDonough is a university librarian who once studied English Literature at Oxford but had to leave before earning her PhD to return to the US and care for her very ill mother.  She jumps at the chance to return to England when her doctor boyfriend attends a conference there.  Taking time to revisit her beloved Oxford, she makes a fantastical discovery when she purchases a two hundred year old book of poetry in a used bookshop.  Tucked in the uncut pages is an unfinished and unsigned letter that Samantha recognizes as written in Jane Austen's inimitable style.  She is thrilled by her find and certain of its authorship but even more intriguing is the letter's reference to a manuscript regrettably lost and never found at Greenbriar in Devonshire.  She can hardly believe that there could be an undiscovered Jane Austen manuscript tucked away in this country estate and barely containing her excitement, she does what any serious Austenite would do; she travels to Devonshire to meet with the owner of Greenbriar and try to convince him to allow her to search for the missing manuscript.

When she arrives in Devonshire at Greenbriar, she meets Anthony Whitaker, who has newly inherited the crumbling Georgian pile from his father.  He intends to sell the rundown home because the financial burden is just too great and he is initially dismissive of Sam's quest.  But after a little time to consider it, he agrees that he will in fact help her search and their careful looking turns up evidence in a guest book that Jane Austen and her family did in fact visit Greenbriar.  This confirmation makes Sam more convinced that the manuscript exists and she and Anthony do quickly find the manuscript.  Once it is discovered, the question of what to do with this almost priceless literary treasure looms large with Sam having one idea and Anthony another.  As they read The Stanhopes chapter by chapter, they also get to know one another a bit better, discovering a real connection with each other which is threatened not only by the existence of Sam's boyfriend but also by their completely opposing views on how to handle the manuscript's future.

The novel within a novel works here, engaging the reader as much in the Stanhopes' lives as in Samantha and Anthony's.  In fact, there might be a bit more unpredictability in the imagined "transitional" Austen novel than in the modern-set portions of the book.  James has captured the spirit of Austen beautifully if not exactly the language in this charming homage to Austen's works, themes, and readers.  She does a good job of mimicking the basis plot structure, the character types, and the occasional social digs that are so characteristic to Austen's works in her created manuscript of The Stanhopes.  And her modern day hero and heroine find themselves at odds in a way that Austen would easily recognize as well.  Money still drives the world today, much as it did in Austen's time and although it isn't the only component of happiness, it certainly does make a difference.  The end would have been more satisfying if there had been more depth to it but since it wraps up just as it should, it is still pleasing enough.  Overall a delightful read, it makes me want to go digging about in old manor homes in England looking for just this sort of tale.

Thanks to the publisher for sending me a copy of the book for review.

Monday, March 18, 2013

Review: Capital of the World by Charlene Mires

In this day and age, it's hard to imagine the United Nations being located anywhere but New York City. But how did it end up there in the first place? Who chose a US location? How many other places were considered? Charlene Mires' book, Capital of the World: The Race to Host the United Nations, takes an in-depth look at the competition between cities, suburbs, and towns around the US to become the permanent home of the United Nations. Much as cities and countries now compete to host the Olympics and or political conventions, they once competed to entice the United Nations into their backyards, showcasing civic pride, touting history, and highlighting natural beauty.

Starting with the very birth of the United Nations Organization as the Second World War was winding down, Mires traces the politics, personal preferences, travel concerns, and various other considerations that played into the final decision of where to place the headquarters and which place in the US would be able to claim the title of "Capital of the World." The competitors for the honor ranged from cities like Philadelphia, Chicago, and San Francisco to suburbs around the country, from scenic areas like the Black Hills of South Dakota to US/Canada border towns like Sault Ste. Marie, MI and Niagara Falls, NY. Mires introduces readers to the biggest boosters from each area and chronicles the paths of their campaigns. While she details the excitement and possibilities being generated in each of these UN location hopefuls, she also takes readers into the committee rooms of the newly created UN where debate on the needs for a location were determined and then changed and changed again. She writes of the sometimes seemingly arbitrary reasons behind excluding otherwise suitable places and including other less than suitable locations. As a personal side note, I am selfishly glad that the UN didn't choose Sault Ste. Marie because if they had located themselves on Sugar Island, our annual summer family experience at Clyde's Drive-In wouldn't be the same. Burger joint aside, I can't for a minute imagine a UN complex in the area and found it fascinating to even try.

In setting the stories of all these varied places together, Mires has drawn a pretty comprehensive portrait of the climate in the US in the immediate aftermath of the war. She has captured the patriotism and pride in community that was so prevalent, the overwhelming desire to support an organization that promised to prevent another all-encompassing war to which so many sacrificed sons, and the conviction that anyone and any place, large or small, could be a part of history. She's also presented the question of the UN's location in the larger framework of the political and social climate of the country at the time as well, facing housing shortages with veterans returning home, the need for employment opportunities for all these men, the racial tensions and codified discrimination of the time, and the fear of losing local sovereignty and perhaps more importantly, property and homes, to an international organization.

This story of exactly how the UN found its home in New York City is quite comprehensive. Both people and places are introduced and explored in detail from the initial interest in hosting the UN to the tactics used to further their claims throughout the decision making period. The UN's waffling and uncertainty about exactly what would best serve their organization, a "capital of the world" city set apart from pre-existing cities or simply a headquarters building located within an existing infrastructure, is also explored in depth. Each of the back stories of place and people are intriguing and unknown to most readers (this one included). They can, at times, be a little over-detailed and in some cases are so similar as to make for occasionally repetitive reading. The struggles to define exactly what the UN was looking for showcases the continuing difficulties we see in the world when so many disparate countries and people try to come together as one. The included architectural renderings that many of the competing locations created were fascinating and explained how each community viewed the UN and its purpose. This history of a place we could never imagine elsewhere now and the original question of where to locate it is illustrative of the immense possibilities the country, and the world as a whole, faced in the late 1940s. History buffs and UN enthusiasts will find this an easy and fulfilling read although others might be a bit bogged down by the minutia.

For more information about Charlene Mires and the book check out her university website, the publisher's website, or the book's blog. Follow the rest of the blog tour or look at the amazon reviews for others' thoughts and opinions on the book.

Thanks to Lisa from TLC Book Tours and the publisher for sending me a copy of this book to review.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

This meme is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.

Books I completed this past week are:

The Comfort of Lies by Randy Susan Meyers
The Lass Wore Black by Karen Ranney
Capital of the World by Charlene Mires

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

Better Than Fiction edited by Don George
Sacred Hearts by Sarah Dunant
Heart Like Mine by Amy Hatvany

Reviews posted this week:

A Place for Us by Liza Gyllenhaal
The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
The Comfort of Lies by Randy Susan Meyers

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

2012

The Missing Manuscript of Jane Austen by Syrie James

2013

none at the moment

Monday Mailbox

Two very different books this week. Each should appeal to different parts of my personality. :-) This past week's mailbox arrivals:

If I Were You by Lisa Renee Jones came from Gallery Books.

A journal sends a high school English teacher on a quest to uncover the fate of the journal writer; this erotic romance sounds sizzling.

The J.M. Barrie Ladies' Swimming Society by Barbara J. Zitwer came from the author.

I can't wait to dive into this novel about a woman faced with professional frustration who discovers a group of elderly women swimming in a freezing cold lake. I do love unusual tales of friendship and this one should be great.

If you'd like to see the marvelous goodies in other people's mailboxes, make sure to visit Chaotic Compendiums as she is hosting this month's Mailbox Monday and have fun seeing how we are all doing our part to keep the USPS and delivery services viable.

Thursday, March 14, 2013

Review: The Comfort of Lies by Randy Susan Meyers

When a child is adopted, unless the adoption is an open adoption, there are unanswered and sometimes unanswerable questions for everyone involved. And it creates ties no matter how invisible, deliberately hidden, or denied between otherwise unconnected people. In Randy Susan Meyers' newest novel, The Comfort of Lies, one five year old girl connects three very different women together and examines the fallout of infidelity, the huge and overwhelming decision to give a child up, and the power of maternal feeling.

Five years ago, Tia had a baby and gave her up for adoption. She receives pictures of the baby she named Honor every year since the adoption was what's called an identified adoption. Somehow, on the fifth anniversary of Honor's birth, leafing through the latest pictures of this child, looking for traces of herself or of Nathan, the child's biological father, something changes for her. She's lived with the pain and regret of having let her baby girl go for five years now but these newest pictures trigger something different and she starts a scrapbook should Honor ever want to know about her. She also sends Nathan a letter with copies of the little girl's pictures and her adoptive family's contact information. That Nathan's wife Juliette, who thought she had forgiven him for the affair he admitted to her more than five years ago, would intercept the letter and see the pictures never occurs to Tia. But Juliette does and stunned to learn of the child's existence, she becomes obsessed with finding more out about this little girl, the baby she never knew about, her husband's daughter, her sons' sister.

Savannah, the name chosen by her adoptive parents, has lived happily with Caroline and Peter for her entire life. Caroline is a dedicated pathologist specializing in pediatric cancer and Peter runs a large, successful company. Caroline allowed Peter to steamroller her into adopting a baby because of his desire for a large family but she feels trapped, uncomfortable, and completely adrift as a mother, certain she's failing her daughter. She doesn't like to get dirty or read books over and over again or play pretend. She delegates care of Savannah to Nanny Rose and to Peter, a doting father who only serves to highlight her own inadequacies.  She escapes into her job and laments her lack of maternal feeling. She feels like she doesn't know how to be a mother and maybe not even a wife anymore but she can't admit her fears and her unhappiness to anyone, least of all to her husband.

When Juliette opens the letter from Tia to Nathan, from that moment on, these three women, Juliette, Caroline, and Tia, are on an unavoidable collision course. Narrated from each of their perspectives and eventually from Nathan's as well, the novel takes a close look at what makes a family, how we judge ourselves and others as parents, the power and importance of truth, and as the title suggests, the ways that lies can comfort us. The characters here are not perfect, in fact they are often times infuriatingly imperfect. They are selfish and self-centered. They don't think. But this very imperfection makes them realistic. That isn't to say that they were all sympathetic characters or that their actions were necessarily understandable but that they were generally unpredictably real. And the basic plot could certainly happen, especially in our casually connected and easily accessible world. As the plot carried each woman further towards the inevitable confrontation, it still managed to hold back just enough to keep the reader engaged. The pacing was well done and carries along evenly through each of the women's struggles as they face and try to overcome their fears. Only through forgiveness, atonement, and the painful truth will they all be able to once again find peace in their perfectly imperfect lives. Despite the fact that I struggled to connect to any of the main characters, I found is a thought provoking read and can say without reservation that it is one that will get and keep book clubs talking.

For more information about Randy Susan Meyers and the book check out her website, follow her on Facebook or Twitter. You can also read her articles on The Huffington Post and follow her Pinterest boards. Follow the rest of the blog tour or look at the amazon reviews for others' thoughts and opinions on the book.

Thanks to Trish from TLC Book Tours and the publisher for sending me a copy of this book to review.

Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Review: The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach

My husband played baseball when he was younger but he'd given it up by the time we met. And each of my sons played as little squirts but quickly decided that it was not the sport for them. And I breathed a sigh of relief. Because baseball is not a particular interest of mine either. I do understand it and can see the beauty in a batter facing a pitcher, each pitting their skills against the other. I understand the skilled choreography on the field as the ball rockets from the bat to a fielder and then from glove to glove. I can appreciate all of that and still find it about as exciting as watching grass grow, which is to say, not very exciting indeed. So it seems a bit out of character for me to choose to read a book so wrapped around baseball and the life lessons inherent in the game but this was a WNBA Great Group Reads choice and I trusted that it would not lull me into a complete stupor like the actual game tends to do. And while it didn't, it also didn't engage me to the degree that would have made it a superlative read but it did do what Great Group Reads are designed to do and that is to spark a sustainable discussion in a group setting.

Set on a small, division III college campus in Wisconsin, Chad Harbach's novel focuses on a tightly connected cast of characters living out an unprecedented baseball season and unexpected life altering events. Henry Skrimshander is an extraordinary shortstop just shy of breaking his hero's record for all time consecutive games without an error. Mike Schartz is the team captain, battling crippling overuse injuries, a catcher who recognized Henry's perfection and potential and recruited Henry to Westish College, and who is the inspirational backbone of the team. Owen Dunne is Henry's roommate, a fellow baseball player with a mellow Zen attitude towards life, a sometime activist, an outstanding student, and a beautiful, appealing gay man. Guert Affenlight is the president of Westish College who has fallen in love for perhaps the first time in his life and who is also having a bit of an existential crisis in his life. Pella Affenlight is Guert's twenty-something daughter who has left the husband she ran off with while still in high school and moved back home with the intention of changing her life, how though she knows not. None of the characters' lives are going quite the way they expect either on the diamond or off of it. Each of them is having an existential crisis and they will have to find a way to adjust to the curve balls they're each facing.

Coming to Westish College as a scrawny freshman with an unparalleled feel for shortstop, Henry spends the next three years in Mike Schwartz's orbit, training hard, bulking up, and bringing his batting up to snuff to match his absolutely perfect, unthinking fielding abilities. Henry hasn't made a fielding error in forever, perhaps ever, if naming his glove Zero is any indication. So when, on the verge of breaking out, matching his hero's accomplishment for error free games, and now that the major league scouts have discovered him and are talking obscene amounts of money, Henry throws a ball that veers off course and smashes sickeningly into his roommate's head, it sends his whole life into a tailspin and starts the major events of the novel into motion. All of a sudden Henry can't focus on anything but the error, crippled by his loss of confidence, choking in the field every subsequent game. And without his firm belief in himself as a baseball player, who is he really?

This is very much a coming of age novel. Failure, fear, and an inability to dare threaten to push several characters off the sharp cusp of an undreamed of future. Henry is not the only one paralysed by his fear of falling short of expectations. Each character, in fact, faces the same demon manifest in its own way in their lives. But Henry is the implement upon which so much is written. He is, quite literally, the skrimshander, the ivory unpon which the tale is inscribed, standing in as representative of each lost and searching character. Harbach certainly mines a Melville connection here beyond just Henry's name, with Guert Affenlight having built his academic career on discovering that Melville once gave a lecture at Westish, the placement of Melville's statue on the lakeshore looking out upon that inland sea with his back to the campus, the Harpooners mascot for their college athletics, and even the similar esprit de corps between a baseball team and a whaling crew. But there is no white whale here unless you accept baseball itself as the elusive and coveted universe. But in fact so much of the novel is not really about baseball but about life and recognizing rather than devaluing your gifts, coming of age, and learning to reach for what means the most so baseball would really be only an imperfect white whale here.

Harbach has chosen big, impressive, and difficult to encapsulate themes. He has gone at them valiantly but they overwhelm the reading itself. His characters are wooden and written strictly to type. And Pella, as the only woman in the novel (Owen's mother and an overly sensitive professor counting for very little given their fleeting contributions to the almost all male tale), seems to exist as a woman solely sexually. In all other ways, she could have been male so ungendered was she. Mike never feels authentically college-aged, coming across as far older and more jaded than even the most quasi-sophisticated 19-22 year old has ever hoped to be. Owen also seems unbelievable as a character most of the time although his seeming veneer so beyond his years might simply be the fact that he is only ever seen through others' eyes in a way that Schwartzy, on whose inner feelings the narrative alternately focuses, is not. Guert Affenlight and Owen's relatonship isn't particularly convincing either, reminiscent of an angsty, immature and uncertain, idealized and unrealistic puppy love than an actual adult coupling. And although Guert is just discovering his latent homosexuality in this obsession with Owen, he's also an adult make with many a relationship behind him so acting as a giddy teenager seems a stretch. But characters aside, the pacing of the novel was a bit on the slow side and the ending was too perfect Hollywood movie predictable to do justice to the existential wrestling throughout the rest of the novel. The parallels between baseball and life are there and fit but I guess I ended up feeling a bit about the book as I do about the game, especially in the second half of the story when there are many pages describing the happenings on the field. I wish I loved this as much as so many others did, including in our book club.

Thanks to the publisher for sending me a copy of this book for review.

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme is hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on.

From the Kitchen of Half Truth by Maria Goodin. The book is being released by Sourcebooks Landmark on April 2, 2013.

Amazon says this about the book: Infused with the delicious warmth of Chocolat and the captivating feeling of School of Essential Ingredients, From the Kitchen of Half Truth is the warm, tender story of Meg, whose cooking-obsessed mother has always regaled her with fantastical memories of their lives that can't possibly be true. As sickness threatens to bury her mother's secrets forever, Meg decides she must know the truth-but no matter how hard she tries, Meg can't convince her mother to reveal a thing. As the two spend one last summer together, savoring cooking lessons, Meg explores the power of the stories we tell ourselves in order to create the lives we want.

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Meet the Authors evening

I don't go to concerts.  Celebrity events appeal to me not at all.  But tell me there's an author coming to town and I can hardly stand it, arranging and re-arranging my crazy life to try and make it there.  Authors are definitely my rock stars, my movie gods, and my dream people all rolled into one.  At least when they are friendly, funny, and personable.  And last night's Meet the Authors event at Park Road Books put on by the Charlotte chapter of the Women's National Book Association met all of my requirements for an outstanding evening.

Flowers spring up all over with the change from winter to spring.  (And yes, here in the sunny south, it is already firmly spring.  Just ask my daffodils and budding trees.)  Publishers too have seasons and spring is a big one as it sees the publication of many new, fantastic books.  Last evening we were treated to five mainly regional authors who have newly released books.  They all spoke briefly and did a short reading before mingling and signing books.  And although I had to duck out part way through for a carpool run, based on what I heard, I'm definitely going to have to add each and every one of the books to my collection.  (OK, in the interest of full disclosure, I've already added some of them prior to the event but now I need to get those I hadn't already.)

First up was Megan Miranda, whose YA novel Hysteria sounds creepy and dark.  She spoke about the sorts of research she does when writing a book and has two major kinds.  Of those two, I loved hearing about what she calls "awkward email research."  This is where she emails experts and asks them questions.  For Hysteria, this included asking her sister in law, a lawyer, which of several proposed scenarios would legally allow a person to get away with murder.  Not surprisingly, her sister in law declined to answer.  She also emailed her former track coach at the boarding school she attended and asked what would happen if a dead body turned up in a dorm room.  She did get a response to this one, with the slightly nervous question of where she intended to set her novel.  ::grin::

Next up was Gina Holmes whose newest novel Wings of Glass focuses on abuse and faith and friendship.  She spoke about her love of writing and how she wasn't sure she could ever write something as long as a novel but she took the advice about writing a page a day resulting in 365 pages (easily novel length) by the end of a year to heart and then proceeded to churn out a novel in six weeks.  Before you want to smack her though, you should know that she admitted the novel was terrible and no one will ever read it.  I know that made me feel much kinder towards her.  :-)  And she wrote several other never to be revealed to the world novels before she changed genres and wrote the first novel she ever sold placing her firmly and happily in literary women's fiction rather than in the thriller section.

The third author to speak was Kim Boykin who pointed out that her novel The Wisdom of Hair was the one with the purple cover.  Purple (or purkle as I called it when I was small) has always been one of my favorite colors.  Her novel features a girl who goes to beauty school to escape a bad home life and encounters a community of supportive women.  I love that this grew out of her memories of going to beauty school with her mom.  She spoke about the fact that often times when women want to change their life, they first change their hair.  I found myself agreeing when I remember that I went off to college and promptly chopped my long hair off as short as possible.  Grew it long again during those four years but then I did the same thing barely a month into my marriage.  Now I have to wonder what my currently long hair, a throwback to high school and college, says about me now?

I am sad to admit that at this point, I had to sneak out of the event and run carpool but I suspect that this saved me some serious money because heaven knows that not only would I have bought the books I was missing out of the five being presented, I would certainly have wandered the store and stocked up on another ton of books I definitely couldn't live without.  (Don't worry Sally, I'll be in to do this anyway just as soon as I find a spare minute in my kid-dominated schedule.)  (And to my loving husband if you are reading this, I am totally lying to Sally.  OK, I'm not.  But you'll love me anyway, won't you?) The books I missed sound great too and I just know the authors were as personable and fun to listen to as the three I did get to hear. 

I didn't get to know more about Holly Goddard Jones or her new novel The Next Time You See Me but there's a great video on her website that gives some interesting background into the book and the characters she's created.  The story itself is set in a small town in Kentucky and is about the way that the disappearance of a woman connects a cast of characters.  It's been called a "Southern thriller," "suspenseful," "eerie," a "page turner," and "genre-defying."






I also missed hearing from Margaret Wrinkle about her fascinating debut novel Wash about slave breeding, love, and heritage.  This gripping sounding book has been called "deeply-felt," "luminous," "lyrical," "significant," "powerful," and "majestic."










If I've made you sufficiently jealous of my evening, know that there are WNBA chapters all across the country who offer wonderful events like this one.  Go to the national WNBA website and find your closest chapter to join in.  Any and all book loving people are welcome.

Monday, March 11, 2013

Review: A Place for Us by Liza Gyllenhaal

As I started to read this novel about consequences, poor decisions and impulse control, I wanted to reach into the book and smack the characters. Instead I was reduced to muttering under my breath about the ridiculous, self-centered stupidity of teenagers. Liza Gyllenhaal's novel A Place for Us tackles a difficult time in parents' lives and an equally emotionally fraught time in kids' lives and explores what happens when things careen out of control.

Brook and Michael Bostock appear to have it all. Brook is an heiress so money is no problem for their family but she also runs the very successful event planning business RSVP with an old college friend. Michael makes exquisite custom wood furniture that commands top dollar. They chose to move their family back to the small Massachusetts town where Michael grew up after 9/11 and they built a gorgeous showpiece of a home there. But there are small cracks under the surface. Brook finds out that Michael knew about her money right from their first meeting, leading her to wonder if he only married her for the security of it rather than for herself. Michael's family and almost all of the townspeople have continued to hold the Bostock family at arm's length. And son Liam, who feels this outsider status most of all, started drinking and smoking pot to cope with his loneliness.  So Brook and Michael pulled him from the local public school and sent him to a private boarding school in hopes of removing him from his troubles.

At the start of the book, he is coming home from school with his roommate Carey and Carey's older brother, the school hockey star, Brandon. Brook and Michael have hired local teenager Phoebe to babysit daughter Tilly until the boys arrive because they plan on being at a party overnight an hour away. But when the boys come through the door, Brandon and Liam are already drunk and high and when Phoebe, who has long been Liam's only friend and confidante in town and who is secretly in love with him, discovers that he's told Brandon and Carey that they have been having sex for years, she is crushed and angry enough to take the bottle they offer her and get herself drunk too. As if this isn't bad enough, Brandon, who has been given a pass on his behaviour for years and feels entitled to take whatever he wants, tries to rape Phoebe. She escapes him but when her father sees the bruises on her and hears about the sexual assault, he vows to take Liam and the Bostocks to court. Still desperately hurt and angry at Liam, Phoebe doesn't correct her father's impression that it was Liam who attacked her. And when her father Troy, who already has a long and troubled history with Michael Bostock, confronts Michael and Liam, Michael gives Liam the impression that he believes his son capable of this terrible and brutal act so Liam doesn't bother to explain that it wasn't him. And then as things snowball, Liam realizes that protecting Brandon could in fact give him an in and acceptance at school and so he makes the ridiculous conscious decision to protect Brandon.

But Phoebe and Liam aren't the only two who have shown a lapse in judgment over the events this night, Brook and Michael made the mistake of leaving these teenagers at their home without supervision, opening themselves up to the recriminations of the town that has never fully accepted them and to prosecution under the Social Host Liability Statute that holds parents responsible for what happens at their home even when they are not there. As they themselves question their actions, they also second guess their previous decisions, choosing to come back to this town to live, sending Liam away to boarding school, and the way they have ceded control of so much to Brook's disapproving half sisters. They have suffered a fatal lack of confidence in their choices and that, coupled with them feeling isolated from each other and the very family and acquaintances who should have made them feel connected, is as troubling as the law suit threatening the Bostocks. Both Brook and Liam struggle with loneliness and their desire to fit in and Liam faces that most potentially devastating of teenaged problems, peer pressure. A missing sense of belonging and connection not only leads Liam to accept and even embrace the false charges but it makes the isolation Brook feels and tries to ignore that much more difficult to overcome, with her having faked happiness and unconcern for so many years now. It is only through finding out the truth and recognizing the value and importance of a place where they are at home as well as the right way to achieve that place that will give these characters any hope of a happy future.

The novel touches on quite a few issues so terrifying to a parent: underage drinking, sexual assault, depression and suicidal thoughts, and more. The teen years are so chock full of angst, real and manufactured, and it's hard not to want to want to haul both Phoebe and Liam over your knee and spank them for being so willfully stupid. What they each suffer is incredibly real but their lack of emotional control and immaturity is absolutely infuriating. The issues of truth and honesty weave throughout the narrative here. Without the cover-ups and lies and the tacit and outright stated collusion by the adults in their lives, the story would not exist. The inclusion of the controversial but very real Social Host Liability statute makes the legal ramifications of the attack on Phoebe that much more important, regardless of whether Liam is at fault or not. It also makes the ease of the resolution of the story not quite work as the truth of the events of that night (which the reader has known all along) should have no bearing on a court case based on this law. So that was a frustrating and unexplained piece of the plot for me.

Liam and Phoebe as characters are very definitely alternately completely self-absorbed and aware of the damage they are causing. But honestly, they are still more over the top than any of the teenagers I know or have living with me currently. And I had a hard time feeling much sympathy for Brook and Michael, who seemed less interested in getting to the root of Liam's problems than they did about appearances and their own angst and history. As for bad guy Brandon, he's a completely cardboard character although clearly necessary for the pivotal moment in the plot. The narrative pacing waxes and wanes through the storytelling of several of the major characters: Michael, Brook, Liam, and Phoebe, but it does allow the reader to see each of their motivations and the secrets they keep even from those to whom they are closest. There is never any doubt that the truth will out here but the ending came about a bit abruptly and felt summed up rather than brought to a fully realized conclusion. Despite my feelings about the main characters and a major unexplained plot resolution, I found this a speedy read. It had a bit of the same feel of after school special for adults that Jodi Picoult's books have and will definitely appeal to her fans and to those who like those legal grey area stories that inspire such judgment and discussion, both pro and con. A good thought provoking book for book clubs to discuss.

Thanks to the publisher for sending me a copy of this book for review.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

This meme is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey.

Books I completed this past week are:

Enchantments by Kathryn Harrison
The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
The Secret of the Nightingale Palace by Dana Sachs
A Place For Us by Liza Gyllenhaal

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

Better Than Fiction edited by Don George
Sacred Hearts by Sarah Dunant
The Comfort of Lies by Randy Susan Meyers

Reviews posted this week:

Birds of a Feather by Jacqueline Winspear
Enchantments by Kathryn Harrison
The Secret of the Nightingale Palace by Dana Sachs
A Different Kind of Normal by Cathy Lamb

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

2012

The Missing Manuscript of Jane Austen by Syrie James

2013

The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
A Place For Us by Liza Gyllenhaal

Monday Mailbox

I do love seeing just what kind of interesting and unexpected combinations of books arrive at my house in the same week. My buying habits are unpredictable enough but the serendipitous oddity of what the post office brings me together never fails to charm me. This past week's mailbox arrivals:

Capital of the World by Charlene Mires came from New York University Press and TLC Book Tours for a blog tour.

Have you ever wondered why the UN is in New York City? I have. And now I have a book that should answer that question for me. Man I love books!

The House at the End of Hope Street by Menna van Praag came from FSB Associates and Pamela Dorman Books.

An enchanted house with talking portraits of literary luminaries that offer advice and assistance to women who are looking to change their lives, this one just completely captures my imagination.

If you'd like to see the marvelous goodies in other people's mailboxes, make sure to visit Chaotic Compendiums as she is hosting this month's Mailbox Monday and have fun seeing how we are all doing our part to keep the USPS and delivery services viable.

Friday, March 8, 2013

Review: A Different Kind of Normal by Cathy Lamb

A family descended from witches (at least according to some family members), a curse that manifests itself in each generation, and just plain quirky characters, Cathy Lamb's newest novel has all of this and more. Jaden Bruxelle is a dedicated hospice nurse and an overprotective mother. She adopted her drug addicted sister's baby when he was only a couple of days old and has been protecting Tate ever since. Tate was born with a much larger than normal sized head and misaligned eyes and his appearance has subjected him to a lifetime of bullying and nasty name calling. A genius, he feels that he could endure the taunts and the ugliness if only he was allowed to try out for the basketball team, having devoted countless hours to practicing against his own backboard. But because of his enlarged head and the shunt he had to have placed to drain extra fluid, Boss Mom Jaden refuses to entertain the idea of him playing and risking injury. Her fears for Tate not only prevent him from trying something he loves but they cripple her as well. She's unwilling to pursue a very strong mutual attraction with Tate's doctor Ethan because if she did, ethically he would no longer be able to keep Tate as his patient and she can't risk not having the top doctor available for her boy.

Fear reigns over courage for Jaden even though it causes Tate great unhappiness and definitely cools their otherwise incredibly close relationship. She knows that she will eventually have to let him live the life he chooses but she's terrified to give him that chance, to give herself that chance as well. While Jaden wrestles with her unmovable decisions, Tate starts an anonymous blog talking about the reality of being him, the kid with the big head, the one people call a monster or a freak. He is completely honest in his entries giving the reader insight into his opinion of his mother's inability to let him be normal in the one way that means the most to him and about the ways in which he sees the world.

While Tate and Jaden argue back and forth about the merits of letting him at least try out for the team, there are quite a few other plot lines weaving through the novel and downright odd characters peopling the pages. There's Jaden's sister and Tate's biological mother, Brooke, a drug addict who abandoned her baby and is threatening to reappear in her family's life, shaky and trying to stay sober; Jaden and Brooke's mother, a famous soap opera actress, flits in and out of the story; and Jaden's brother is a single dad to a little girl with one leg, adopted from India, and to three of the oddest children (triplets to boot) ever created, a retired pro-wrestler, and now a florist who lives just down the street from his uber-competent, tightly buttoned up and clearly repressed sister. Jaden is facing a lawsuit brought against her by the sleazebag son of one of her deceased patients, her back and forth footsy game with the hot doctor continues for much of the novel, and the historical background on the family ancestors and their reputation as witches weaves through the narrative as do Jaden's memories of Brooke's growing addiction. So very much going on between these pages.

While the book certainly has some touching moments and explores some important themes, it comes across as altogether too quirky and overloaded with too many major and minor plot lines. Learning to let go is certainly hard and for Jaden it is complicated by Tate's scary medical history but he's seventeen and she continues to hover over him as if he's a toddler. The fact that she likes to go to the greenhouse and mix up herbal combinations, all of which smell of death and forewarn her of a loved one's imminent demise is a bit heavy handed given all the other foreshadowing in the novel. Many of the oddball characters here are too one dimensional to be believable.  Tate himself is quite obviously the most wonderful teeenaged boy ever. His small sulky moments just reinforce how unrealistic he really is at all other times. And there are bits that just don't add up about Jaden's concern. She is too terrified of the potentials to let Tate try out for the basketball team and yet the kid has been regularly beaten up throughout his life. The fighting is apparently less likely to dislodge his shunt than playing basketball is.

I wanted to like this one so much more than I did. It just went too far over the top for me and didn't reel itself back in with particularly realistic characters. The celebration of oddity and left of normal (by choice or by accident of birth) was fine but to have each and every character have to highlight the fact that our definition of normal is too narrow and reductive was less than subtle and didn't trust readers to get it without handing it to them on a platter. What should have been a warm and quirky read instead descended into predictable and cliched for me and left me disappointed.

Thanks to LibraryThing Early Reviewers for sending me a copy of this book for review.

Thursday, March 7, 2013

Review: The Secret of the Nightingale Palace by Dana Sachs

When I first heard the title of this book, I immediately assumed that it was about Japanese Americans. And in some ways it is. But I would never have dreamed that the two main characters were in fact an eighty-five year old Jewish widow from New York and her thirty something also widowed granddaughter from Memphis. How these two characters would easily connect to the expected story of the Japanese American experience in San Francisco immediately prior to and just following Pearl Harbor was a mystery. But this seemingly incongruous juxtaposition is just what Dana Sachs has presented in her latest novel, The Secret of the Nightingale Palace, and has done so well as to make the connection seamless, unusual, and yet perfectly imagined.

Comic book artist Anna Rosenthal lost her husband Ford to leukemia two years ago and she's been in sort of a holding pattern ever since. She has been estranged from her grandmother for five years because the irrascible, particular, and blunt Goldie Rosenthal never did approve of Ford and made no bones about it. Goldie, having struggled and worked to rise above her poverty-filled Memphis beginnings, was used to getting her own way and so her granddaughter's refusal to see that Ford was all wrong caused a rupture that even his death couldn't heal. But the disappointment of Anna's stubborn insistence that she loved Ford was, in Goldie's eyes, only the latest in a long line of disappointments where she rejected Goldie's counsel. So when the phone rings at the beginning of the novel and it's Goldie requesting that Anna drive her from New York to San Francisco to deliver a book of beautiful Japanese artwork to the Nakamura family for whom she held it during World War II, Anna is surprised and resistant. She can think of very little as unappealing as spending two weeks driving across the country with her persnickety grandmother even if she will get to do it in Goldie's gorgeous and luxurious, antique Rolls Royce. And yet she finds herself agreeing to her grandmother's suddenly pressing mission despite misgivings.

The novel is made up of five parts, alternating between the present day road trip that Goldie and Anna are on and sixty years in the past when Goldie lived in San Francisco and was on the cusp of starting her adult life. As Anna and Goldie travel slowly across the country, they are alternately polite and antagonistic with each other, sometimes addressing their differences and other times intentionally ignoring them. They spar and draw blood as only family who loves you can but they also share moments of understanding and sympathy. The drive also gives Anna time to reflect on her life with Ford, his illness, and the stasis in which she's been trapped since his death. The other major storyline winding through the novel is the revelation of Goldie's past. She moved to San Francisco to be with her married sister and found a job as a salesgirl at Feld's Department Store. Her education in elegance and class comes through the store, its quality contents, and well-heeled clientel as well as her befriending of Mayumi Nakamura, the window display artist for Feld's and whose family is actual Japanese royalty. This time in her young life introduces Goldie to love and regret, to the need to construct her own life on her own terms, and to the knowledge that appearances must be maintained at all costs because even if they are simply a prettily decorated veil covering the truth, they are the foundation upon which everything that matters is built.

The novel is very visual, from the exquisite engravings in the book Goldie wants to return to Mayumi to her obsession with and insistence on timeless but stylish and very expensive clothing. Even the meticulously maintained Rolls Royce presents a certain picture. But the theme of appearance is carried through in other ways as well. There are the surface impressions of marriage and the hidden depths beneath their true facade, a fact that causes Anna distress as she remembers the vitriol and unhappiness in her publically loving marriage to Ford. There are descriptions of the windows Mayumi designs and the feelings these displays are meant to evoke. There's Henry Nakamura's contention to Goldie that being Jewish and being Japanese and subsequently disliked are nothing alike since the Japanese Americans are immediately identifiable whereas Goldie could hide her Jewish identity if she so chose. Coupled with looking is the idea of perspective and looking to the future. A put-together appearance leads to the sort of life Goldie always imagined and worked towards as the wife of a wealthy man. Even at eighty-five, she prefers to look forward rather than back. Even as the novel reveals her past to the reader, Goldie does not share this past with Anna, keeping from her the real reason behind her insistence on returning the prints sixty some years after they were given to her.

Sachs has woven the two stories, Goldie's past and her present with Anna, together well. The present day sections, with Anna's introspection, move slower than the portions in 1941 though. And the past Goldie is much more likable than the critical and snobbish Goldie of the present but her past formed her and its inclusion in the narrative helps to excuse some of her less likable moments.  The play between Anna and Goldie as they try to create a relationship with each other again, one based on acceptance and love rather than judgment and expectation is presented realistically and keeps the road trip portion of the novel from dragging too badly in comparison with the past sections. There are some moments, especially on the road, that don't seem to move the plot along but eventually the narrative picks back up and starts to move again.  And the ending is truly charming.  A lovely book about unexpected depths and finding your own happiness, Sachs has written a satisfying tale simultaneously both contemporary and historical of belonging and acceptance, appearance and truth, and how to find the way forward no matter what hand you're dealt.

For more information about Dana Sachs and the book check out her website, follow her on Facebook or Twitter. Follow the rest of the blog tour or look at the amazon reviews for others' thoughts and opinions on the book.

Thanks to Trish from TLC Book Tours and the publisher for sending me a copy of this book to review.

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