Book Review: The Women by Kristin Hannah

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: The Women
Author: Kristin Hannah
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press
Publication date: February 6, 2024
Length: 480 pages
Genre: Historical fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

From the celebrated author of The Nightingale and The Four Winds comes Kristin Hannah’s The Women—at once an intimate portrait of coming of age in a dangerous time and an epic tale of a nation divided.

Women can be heroes. When twenty-year-old nursing student Frances “Frankie” McGrath hears these words, it is a revelation. Raised in the sun-drenched, idyllic world of Southern California and sheltered by her conservative parents, she has always prided herself on doing the right thing. But in 1965, the world is changing, and she suddenly dares to imagine a different future for herself. When her brother ships out to serve in Vietnam, she joins the Army Nurse Corps and follows his path.

As green and inexperienced as the men sent to Vietnam to fight, Frankie is over- whelmed by the chaos and destruction of war. Each day is a gamble of life and death, hope and betrayal; friendships run deep and can be shattered in an instant. In war, she meets—and becomes one of—the lucky, the brave, the broken, and the lost.

But war is just the beginning for Frankie and her veteran friends. The real battle lies in coming home to a changed and divided America, to angry protesters, and to a country that wants to forget Vietnam.

The Women is the story of one woman gone to war, but it shines a light on all women who put themselves in harm’s way and whose sacrifice and commitment to their country has too often been forgotten. A novel about deep friendships and bold patriotism, The Women is a richly drawn story with a memorable heroine whose idealism and courage under fire will come to define an era.

I’ll put it simply: Kristin Hannah’s new book is a stunner. In this dramatic story of a young woman’s experiences as a nurse during the Vietnam War and the wrenchingly difficult life she comes home to, we live through hell and then some with the sympathetic, compelling main character.

Frances McGrath is a child of privilege, a lovely young woman fresh out of nursing school, the daughter of a wealth family living on San Diego’s Coronado Island. She comes from a family of military heroes — her father even has a “hero wall” in his study, with framed photos of the generations of men who served their country. That’s right — men. It’s not until her beloved only brother ships out to begin his naval tour, after a fancy family party, that Frankie realizes that women can be heroes too. Feeling a bit lost without her big brother and wanting to share some of her father’s admiration, she joins the Army Nurse Corps — the only branch that will allow a nurse with so little real-world experience to head to Vietnam.

Frankie is in for many rude awakenings, starting with her parents’ reaction. It turns out, she’s misinterpreted everything. Military service is something to be proud of only in the case of sons, not daughters. Frankie is an embarrassment, nothing more.

Still, she excels at basic training, but finds herself completely out of her depth when she arrives in Vietnam, where she quickly realizes that her quiet hospital rounds back home did nothing to prepare her for the horrors of Vietnam’s reality. Fortunately, she’s taken under the wings of her two roommates, Barb and Ethel, women whose experience and guidance help Frankie survive her first few weeks of war. Eventually, Frankie rises to the occasion, becoming a skilled, brave, and compassionate surgical nurse.

Vietnam also provides Frankie with romantic entanglements, and suffice it to say that the outcome is as tragic as you’d expect in a war zone. Frankie’s time in-country comprises the first half or so of the book. It’s harrowing, tragic, upsetting, and yet, gorgeously written. It’s so visceral that we feel we’re there with Frankie, and she herself is given space to grow, feel, and experience everything around her. Readers will walk away feeling that they truly know this person.

Frankie’s return to the States is yet another awful shock. As we know from history, returning vets were spat at, reviled, and called baby killers. Frankie is emotionally drained, distraught, and has nowhere to turn. In low moments, when she seeks help at the VA and tries to join a veterans’ “rap” group, she’s turned away by male vets who inform her that, despite what she tries to tell them, there were no woman in Vietnam.

Her downward spiral is awful, compounded by some shady people in her life, but even with the love and support of her close friends, she’s mainly alone in a very, very dark place. Frankie’s experiences are heartbreaking. Even as we see her making terrible decisions and using very bad judgment, we can sympathize and understand how hopeless and out of place she feels.

It’s probably obvious that The Women is not an easy book to read, but it’s absolutely worth the emotional investment. The writing is fantastic, descriptive and personal while also plunging us headlong into the scenes of wartime hell — but what really elevates this book is the in-depth look into the heart and soul of such a fascinating and complex woman.

The Women is also quite informative, relaying the experiences of women serving in Vietnam in a way that doesn’t often get the spotlight. The author’s notes at the end are very helpful, as are the reference books and additional sources she lists. (In fact, one of the books she recommends is A Piece of My Heart: The Stories of 26 American Women Who Served in Vietnam, which I read many years ago, but am now tempted to read again.)

The book also brought back memories of the TV series China Beach, which I loved… and which (sadly) does not appear to be available to stream anywhere. Bring back China Beach!

But back to The Women: It’s a beautiful, sad, disturbing, powerful read. After finishing the book a few days ago, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. Another don’t-miss book from a talented author — highly recommended.

26Aug2023

Book Review: Don’t Forget to Write by Sara Goodman Confino

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Don’t Forget to Write
Author: Sara Goodman Confino
Publisher: Lake Union Publishing
Publication date: September 1, 2023
Length: 334 pages
Genre: Historical fiction
Source: Prime First Reads (free during August)
Rating:

In 1960, a young woman discovers a freedom she never knew existed in this exhilarating, funny, and emotional novel by the bestselling author of She’s Up to No Good.

When Marilyn Kleinman is caught making out with the rabbi’s son in front of the whole congregation, her parents ship her off to her great-aunt Ada for the summer. If anyone can save their daughter’s reputation, it’s Philadelphia’s strict premier matchmaker. Either that or Marilyn can kiss college goodbye.

To Marilyn’s surprise, Ada’s not the humorless septuagenarian her mother described. Not with that platinum-blonde hair, Hermès scarf, and Cadillac convertible. She’s sharp, straight-talking, takes her job very seriously, and abides by her own rules…mostly. As the summer unfolds, Ada and Marilyn head for the Jersey shore, where Marilyn helps Ada scope out eligible matches—for anyone but Marilyn, that is.

Because if there’s one thing Marilyn’s learned from Ada, it’s that she doesn’t have to settle. With the school year quickly approaching and her father threatening to disinherit her, Marilyn must make her choice for her future: return to the comfortable life she knows or embrace a risky, unknown path on her own.

What a treat to take a chance on a book I’d never heard of… and end up loving it! I came across Don’t Forget to Write through a promotional email for this month’s free Prime Reading choices. The cover caught my eye, and I once I read the description, I figured… why not?

Set in the summer of 1960, Don’t Forget to Write starts with a bang, as a rebellious 20-year-old — whose father only agreed to send her to college so she could find a husband — decides to make out with the cute son of the rabbi during Saturday morning services… and ends up crashing through a stained glass window with him, mid-kiss, in front of everyone. It’s a scandal — a scandal, I tell you!

While the rabbi and Marilyn’s parents all seem to feel that the only solution is for Marilyn and Daniel to get married, Marilyn has no intention of doing so. She’s grown up seeing her mother’s boredom as a housewife (dinner is often burned because her mother is too busy reading to check on the food), and she’s determined that she will not have that same fate.

Facing parental wrath, Marilyn is forced into the only acceptable alternative: She’ll go spend the summer with her great-aunt Ada, a matchmaker in Philadelphia, with a reputation for strictness and keeping a tight rein on anyone under her control. Upon arrival, Marilyn finds that Ada is a no-nonsense free spirit, and yes, she has very strict rules for Marilyn, but she’s also fierce, outspoken, generous, and a big believer in thinking for oneself.

Before long, the two head for Ada’s home on the island of Avalon on the Jersey Shore, where further adventures await, including glamorous nights out in Atlantic City and sunbathing (with Coppertone!) on the beach while wearing the latest fashionable bikini. Ada is not what Marilyn expected, and under her care, Marilyn starts to bloom into the independent young woman she was meant to be.

Don’t Forget to Write is such an enjoyable read, in so many ways. I loved the depiction of the era — we know the looser vibe of the late 60s is just a little way in the future, but for Marilyn, those freedoms will be too late unless she comes up with her own plans. She’s very much still a hostage to the morals and traditions of the 1950s, when any woman who breaks the mold of wife and mother is judged and scorned.

Avalon is described wonderfully, as is the sense of Atlantic City in its heyday. Ada herself is marvelous — feisty, smart, strong, entrepreneurial, seemingly hard as nails but with quite a loving heart underneath her tough exterior.

The Jewish elements are really engaging as well, and I couldn’t help but laugh at the scenes of scandal in the synagogue! While this takes place before my own time, it definitely mirrors the era in which my parents were young adults, and knowing their stories, I could really relate to some of the scenes and dialogue here.

The relationship between Marilyn and Ada deepens over the course of the book, and is both funny and touching. Marilyn’s growth and the realizations she has about her life and her choices are well-developed, and I really enjoyed seeing her figure out what she wants out of life, what she’s willing to accept, and what she’s prepared to fight for.

The ending may have been a smidge predictable, but that’s okay. Overall, Don’t Forget to Write is an entertaining look at women’s lives in a bygone era, with a terrific mix of nostalgia, summer breezes, and strong characters.

I’m so happy I decided to pick up this book! It’s rare these days that I read something that I know nothing about ahead of time — what fun to just go for it and have it turn out so well!

9Aug2023

Book Review: California Golden by Melanie Benjamin

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: California Golden
Author: Melanie Benjamin
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Publication date: August 8, 2023
Length: 368 pages
Genre: Historical fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

Two sisters navigate the turbulent, euphoric early days of California surf culture in this dazzling saga of ambition, sacrifice, and longing for a family they never had, from the New York Times bestselling author of The Aviator’s Wife

Southern California, 1960s: endless sunny days surfing in Malibu, followed by glittering neon nights at Whisky A-Go-Go. In an era when women are expected to be housewives, Carol Donelly is breaking the mold as a legendary female surfer struggling to compete in a male-dominated sport–and her daughters, Mindy and Ginger, bear the weight of her unconventional lifestyle.

The Donnelly sisters grow up enduring their mother’s absence–physically, when she’s at the beach, and emotionally, the rare times she’s at home. To escape questions about Carol’s whereabouts–and chase their mom’s elusive affection–they cut school to spend their days in the surf. From her first time on a board, Mindy shows a natural talent, but Ginger, two years younger, feels out of place in the water.

As they grow up and their lives diverge, Mindy and Ginger’s relationship ebbs and flows. Mindy finds herself swept up in celebrity, complete with beachside love affairs, parties at the Playboy Club, and USO tours to Vietnam. Meanwhile, Ginger–desperate for a community of her own–is tugged into the vibrant counterculture of drugs and cults. Through it all, their sense of duty to each other survives, as the girls are forever connected by the emotional damage they carry from their unorthodox childhood.

A gripping, emotional story set at a time when mothers were expected to be Donna Reed, not Gidget, California Golden is an unforgettable novel about three women living in a society that was shifting as tempestuously as the breaking waves.

Content warning: Parental neglect, child abandonment, partner abuse, cults, violence.

In California Golden, a legacy of neglectful parenting leads sisters Mindy and Ginger to the Southern California surf culture of the 1960s. Ignored and starved for affection by their mother Carol, whose own dreams were cut short by an unplanned pregnancy and the marriage that followed, the sisters throw themselves into surfing as a way to follow their mother and make sure she doesn’t abandon them completely. But while Mindy takes to surfing almost instinctively and displays a huge talent for it, Ginger struggles to keep up.

Over time, Mindy becomes a champion surfer, a surfing stand-in for the stars of beach party movies, and a spokesmodel for sponsors keen to have her sunny good looks and popularity attached to their brands. As Mindy becomes more involved with the club and music scene, Ginger instead gets caught up in the personal aura of a self-proclaimed “Surf God”, a charismatic beach bum who deplores surfing’s commercialization and who demands absolute devotion.

As years go by, Mindy and Ginger are pulled farther and farther apart by their different worlds — Mindy immersed in celebrity and stardom, while Ginger falls deeper into an abusive, all-encompassing relationship that leaves her powerless and penniless.

Meanwhile, Carol seems to live in her own world, always resentful of the sacrifices she had to make for the sake of motherhood, and wanting more than anything to reclaim her own body and her own passions.

With the Vietnam War ramping up and the surfing craze finally passing its peak, the lives of these three women intersect again and again, not always in ways that they’d expected or wanted.

Through these characters, California Golden shows the incredibly strong pressure (and hypocritical stances) imposed on women of the late 1950s and 1960s — to fit in, to become wives and mothers, to put men and children first, and to always do it with a smile. Carol is a hard person to sympathize with, but when later in the book, we get more of the story of her younger years, it’s clear that she faced a no-win situation where every last ounce of agency was stripped away from her. It’d hard to feel sorry for a neglectful mother, but at least we get to see how she ended up where she did.

The dynamic between Mindy and Ginger is complicated and sad, and it’s excruciating to see Ginger become pulled further and further into abuse, neglect, and a cult-like life revolving around drug smuggling and obedience.

The depiction of SoCal surf culture is evocative, although Mindy’s time in the music and celebrity life of the Sunset Strip feels somewhat repetitive of other books set in that era — the surf elements feel new and fresh, but the rest less so.

I appreciated the web of relationships and connections, but would have liked certain romantic connections to have more time to grow and breathe, and a conflict over racism isn’t especially well developed. I got the sense at various points that this book was trying to cram in too many iconic elements of the 1960s, sometimes to the point of overwhelming the central focus on the sisters and their mother.

The chapters focused on Mindy and Ginger’s childhood are so hard to read, so that when we do finally get the opportunity late in the book to learn about events from Carol’s perspective, it’s too late to salvage much in the way of good feelings toward her… but at least we get the chance to understand, even if we don’t condone or feel much empathy.

Reading California Golden, it’s impossible not to be grateful for reliable birth control and freedom of choice, endangered as that may be. If you want to convince someone that pregnancy and childbirth are traumatic, you might want to give them a copy of this book.

After a slow start (hampered by some weird chronology early on), the book begins to pick up steam — so while I wasn’t sure about it at first, by the midpoint, I was hooked and couldn’t put the book down. While I eventually got very caught up in the characters’ lives, I felt the ending tried to shoe-horn in too much, and left me with questions that I couldn’t ignore, despite the deliberate emotional fireworks.

Overall, I found California Golden entertaining, but questioned some of the plot choices, and didn’t feel that certain 1960s touchpoints added anything new or fresh to the book. It’s an interesting work of historical fiction, and for anyone interested in the era, it’s worth checking out.

11Nov2020

Shelf Control #242: Mrs. Everything by Jennifer Weiner

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Shelf Control is a weekly celebration of the unread books on our shelves. Pick a book you own but haven’t read, write a post about it (suggestions: include what it’s about, why you want to read it, and when you got it), and link up! For more info on what Shelf Control is all about, check out my introductory post, here.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

Title: Mrs. Everything
Author: Jennifer Weiner
Published: 2019
Length: 416 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

Do we change or does the world change us?
Jo and Bethie Kaufman were born into a world full of promise.
Growing up in 1950s Detroit, they live in a perfect “Dick and Jane” house, where their roles in the family are clearly defined. Jo is the tomboy, the bookish rebel with a passion to make the world more fair; Bethie is the pretty, feminine good girl, a would-be star who enjoys the power her beauty confers and dreams of a traditional life.
But the truth ends up looking different from what the girls imagined. Jo and Bethie survive traumas and tragedies. As their lives unfold against the background of free love and Vietnam, Woodstock and women’s lib, Bethie becomes an adventure-loving wild child who dives headlong into the counterculture and is up for anything (except settling down). Meanwhile, Jo becomes a proper young mother in Connecticut, a witness to the changing world instead of a participant. Neither woman inhabits the world she dreams of, nor has a life that feels authentic or brings her joy. Is it too late for the women to finally stake a claim on happily ever after?

How and when I got it:

I bought this book earlier this year, after its paperback release.

Why I want to read it:

First of all, the author: I haven’t read all of Jennifer Weiner’s books by a long shot, but I’ve loved the ones I’ve read!

Even more, I think the story sounds fabulous. I love a good 1960s setting in fiction, and the focus on women’s lives and how they interact with each other and with the major events of their era makes me really want to read this book.

(It doesn’t hurt either that there’s a Connecticut setting for at least part of the book — I’ve lived in San Francisco for a long time, but my a piece of my heart is still connected to my CT hometown!)

What do you think? Would you read this book?

Please share your thoughts!

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Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments or link back from your own post, so I can add you to the participant list.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

23Sep2012

Book Review: Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Book Review: Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter

If not for all the rave reviews out there, I might never have picked up Beautiful Ruins on my own. And that would have been a shame.

Based on the dustjacket flap, this didn’t really sound like a book for me. Hollywood producers. Scandal on the set of Cleopatra in the 1960s. Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, for God’s sake. Do I care about any of this?

As it turns out, the answer is yes. Beautiful Ruins is a vast book, in terms of subject matter if not actual page length. (For the record, the book is 337 pages long). What sounded to me like a relatively simple story of worlds colliding is in actuality a tale that spans decades and continents, with a cast of characters so large that it shouldn’t work — but it does.

Beautiful Ruins starts in 1962 in a small Italian fishing village — so small that neighboring villages look down at it, so isolated that arrival by boat is the only access, a place so not of note that no one arrives here by accident, ever. Into this village comes Dee Moray, a young beautiful wannabe starlet, believing herself to be dying and awaiting a final assignation with her lover. Dee is sent to stay at the one hotel in the village, run by Pasquale, son of the recently deceased innkeeper, come home to fulfill his father’s unrealistic dream of turning the family inn into a tourist attraction.

Dee has been sent packing to Porto Vergogna from the set of the Burton/Taylor movie fiasco, Cleopatra. The reasons for her exile unfold throughout the story, and all is not as it seems. Pasquale is smitten and finds a new purpose in championing Dee’s tragic cause.

Meanwhile, in modern-day Hollywood, a young assistant on the verge of walking away from her job with a legendary producer and giving up on the business once and for all is roped back in by the sudden appearance of an old man seeking a woman once encountered, briefly but intensely, fifty years earlier.

Adding to all this, we see bits of screenplays and manuscripts, a stage play and a movie pitch, and meet people across the years, from 1960s to present, with stops in Seattle, Idaho, Edinburgh, Rome, and Florence. Bit players come and go; some have a huge impact on the unfolding drama, some appear only long enough to spin events off into a new direction.

Amazingly, it works. What I’d initially thought would be a story following two main plot threads evolved into a story with seemingly endless characters and lives, all taking different trajectories, separate but connected by coincidences and happenstance. The characters’ intersections are fascinating, and I couldn’t help wondering at the dexterity with which the author keeps all of the plot points moving forward and continuing to matter.

My quibbles, if any, are that there are a few minor characters whom I would have like to learn more about and seen fleshed out to a greater degree, such as the shiftless musician we encounter midway through the book, and others whose role is so minor that fewer pages devoted to them might have been better, such as the self-deluding young screenwriter who ends up functioning as translator throughout the book. Likewise, a subplot concerning the Donner party (of all things!) was a bit overplayed and seemed unnecessary.

Still, Beautiful Ruins was both absorbing and moving, and I found myself completely engrossed in the characters’ lives. Ultimately, for many of the characters, a choice (or several choices) had to be made. Pasquale reflects, late in the book, on a childhood memory concerning a decision he once had to make, and remembers his mother’s advice:

“Sometimes,” she said, “what we want to do and what we must do are not the same.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “Pasqo, the smaller the space between your desire and what is right, the happier you will be.”

For the characters in Beautiful Ruins, navigating this space is what forms the core of the choices they must make, and the decisions they make and the actions they take set the course for their chances of happiness. Seeing these choices play out is what makes this book so fascinating.