Tis the season: One Perfect Summer by Brenda Novak

by joycesmysteryandfictionbookreviewsMarch 31, 2020

MY EARLIER REVIEW

  Do you enjoy women’s fiction?  Are you ready to be immersed in a long (464 page) book?  If you  might answer yes to these questions, this title could provide you with an escapist read.

The setting is Lake Tahoe, a beautiful and peaceful place with lots of water, places to walk and sports to enjoy.  There are three protagonists; Serenity, Reagan and Lorelei.

Serenity writes books about true crimes.  There is a true crime in her personal life that has changed everything for her.  Next is Reagan; she is an ambitious, successful advertising executive until one decision and one moment changes everything. She will be faced with some big decisions. Then there are Lorelei and her four year old daughter Lucy.  Lorelei grew up in foster care and knows nothing about her family.  She was happy in her marriage until…

What do these women have in common?  No spoiler as this comes out early in the novel; the three share a blood relationship discovered after they did testing with a DNA site.  How are they connected?  Who is their common biological relative?  Why has no-one ever discussed any of this with any of them>  You will need to get very close to the end of the book to find the answer.

Around this central plot there are many others involving the sisters’ families, their evolving relationship and their next door neighbors, all of whom have their own stories.  The strands intertwine and four narrators voice the story; these are the three sisters and Finn, one of the neighbors.

Overall, this was a book where the pages turned.  The characters are well established and each is very much their own person.  That said, I think that the novel might have been (even) better had it been shorter.  Sometimes sections replayed things that were already known to the reader.

This was the first novel that I have read by this author.  I would most likely read another of her books.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this title in exchange for an honest review.

It’s not so easy to be the: Grown Ups by Marian Keyes

by joycesmysteryandfictionbookreviewsNovember 30, 2020

MY EARLIER REVIEW

I first got to know the books by Ms. Keyes when I read her first, Watermelon. It was an engaging story with both complications and heart. I think that those two qualities best describe this author’s subsequent books, including this one.

Grown Ups is a long book at over 500 pages so just perfect for settling in with on these days of early dark. It is a family story in which, at the beginning of the novel, all of the main characters are close to each other. However, the training wheels come off and the ride gets more unstable when one of the main characters, Cara, suffers a concussion. This results in her speaking thoughts, opinions and secrets without being able to stop. What will this mean to her husband, his brothers and their spouses? Will what comes out destroy this family or make its’ members stronger?

It is hard to offer more praise for this title than what has already been offered by others such as JoJo Moyes and Liane Moriarty along with print media including many, many British newspapers and magazines. I will just say that Irish author Marian Keyes knows how to write an engaging story. Give this one a try…and then go back to read some of her other novels.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this title. All opinions are my own.

By the way, this is an e book bargain today, November 30, 2020.

https://nyti.ms/3puO2ir

https://nyti.ms/3tAIF3V

Rebel Girls Lead

25 Tales of Powerful Women

by Rebel Girls

This book belongs on the shelves of young girls. It will show them all that women can do and hopefully encourage them to feel that they can do anything on which their sights are set. Each of these women is worth reading about. Some of those included are Aly Raisman, Cleopatra, Eufrosina Cruz, Jacinda Ardern, Kamala Harris, Melinda Gates, Michelle Obama, Ricoberta Menchu Tu and Stacey Abrams. Some of these women may already be known to you and a child that you know but others most likely may not be. All are inspirational. Each is featured in two pages, one of text and the other with a bright illustration.

The biographies are followed by some activities. A girl can write her own story, draw a portrait, think about the kind of leader they are and more.

This is a terrific entry in an excellent series. I highly recommend it.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this title. All opinions are my own.

A Novel

by Laura Imai Messina

Pub Date 09 Mar 2021

Favorite books of mine include The Book of Dreams and The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George, Becoming Mrs Lewis by Patti Callahan, and Everything Love Is by Claire King. One quality that these novels have in common is a deeper emotional resonance than is found in much fiction. To this list of my own treasured favorites, I am adding The Phone Booth at the End of the World. It is a unique and uniquely moving read.

The tsunami that swept Japan over a decade ago left much destruction in its wake. There was loss of property, community and the lives of those that many loved. Yui, the protagonist of this novel, lost her mother and daughter. She continues her work at a radio station but is broken inside.

Yui hears of a phone booth at a remote location in Japan. It is not connected but has become a kind of shrine. People go there to speak into the phone with the loved ones that they have lost. On her first trip to this pilgrimage site, Yui meets Takeshi. His wife died in the tsunami, leaving him with a beloved daughter who has been mute ever since. Yui and Takeshi become companions who visit the phone booth each month. They come to know each other well and to share in life, loss and healing. There are other characters who also have faced this incomprehensible loss, as for example, a high school student. They also take their places in the book.

This novel has a gorgeous design. Each chapter has a line drawing at its start. The reader might see birds in flight, an old fashioned telephone or a book for example. Short chapters alternate with even shorter chapters. The very short chapters are lists. A reader might learn what Yui’s favorite Bossa Nova music is or what her daughter was wearing on the day of the storm or what gifts Yui had bought for her but had not, as yet, given to her. These chapters add to the poignancy of the story.

I highly recommend this novel. It will engage you, make you think and, perhaps, inspire you.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this title. All opinions are my own.