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Book Review: Leave Me by Gayle Forman

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Leave Me

For every woman who has ever fantasized about driving past her exit on the highway instead of going home to make dinner, for every woman who has ever dreamed of boarding a train to a place where no one needs constant attention–meet Maribeth Klein. A harried working mother who’s so busy taking care of her husband and twins, she doesn’t even realize she’s had a heart attack.

Afterward, surprised to discover that her recuperation seems to be an imposition on those who rely on her, Maribeth does the unthinkable: She packs a bag and leaves. But, as is so often the case, once we get to where we’re going, we see our lives from a different perspective. Far from the demands of family and career and with the help of liberating new friendships, Maribeth is finally able to own up to secrets she has been keeping from those she loves and from herself.

With big-hearted characters who stumble and trip, grow and forgive, Leave Me is about facing our fears. Gayle Forman, a dazzling observer of human nature, has written an irresistible novel that confronts the ambivalence of modern motherhood head-on.

This is going to be a tough one to review. On the one hand, I love Gayle Forman’s writing. You should see my Kindle — section after section of highlighting all my favorite little paragraphs and fabulous wording. On the other hand… I pretty much didn’t buy the premise for a second.

Maribeth is in her early forties, raising twins, a busy New York career woman. Her best friend Elizabeth is also her boss, and lately Maribeth feels like their friendship has been lost to their working relationship. Life is busy, busy, busy — and even as she’s in the hospital getting checked out after her initial chest pains, it’s still on Maribeth’s shoulders to plan dinner and arrange the family’s social obligations.

After emergency open-heart surgery, Maribeth is back home with her family — but it’s still all too much. She’s the planner, the organizer, the worrier, the arranger. She’s the key breadwinner. Her husband is pretty laid back, and does his work out of passion, not in pursuit of a dollar. Even in convalescence, the pressure on Maribeth never ends, and it seems like everyone is just waiting for her to snap back into her normal role.

And so, three week after surgery, Maribeth leaves a note and disappears, resurfacing in Pittsburgh one train ride later, with wads of cash in her pocket and a brand new clean slate. She rents an apartment — in cash — under an altered version of her name, finds a new cardiologist — who accepts cash — and sets about living a simple, unencumbered, no responsibilities kind of life.

There’s a darker, more secret reason for Maribeth’s flight as well. She’s adopted, but has never known anything about her birth mother. Now, as she deals with her health issues and worries about what sort of mother she is, she’s consumed by the need to find out more about her own origins. She knows that she was born in Pittsburgh, so this is where she’ll start her search.

That’s the basic idea. Along the way, Maribeth befriends the young roommates who live in her building, as well as an older women who helps people find their birth parents and even her new cardiologist, a man with his own secret and painful past. For the first time in a long time, Maribeth makes friends who have no strings attached — no PTA or twins groups or work colleagues — just people she enjoys spending time with. She relaxes. She starts to exercise and eat better. She is unplugged — just a burner cell phone, no email, no laptop, no internet. It’s great — and yet, she misses her family, and starts a collection of unsent letters to her children.

So, what did I enjoy about this book? Well, Gayle Forman can write, that’s for sure. The characters are well-defined and quirky, clearly individuals rather than standard cookie cutter types. While there’s emotion and sorrow in Leave Me, there are also plenty of light, funny moments. Maribeth’s stress and fears are instantly relateable, and it’s no surprise that her crazy, high-pressure life leaves her in such dire straits, health-wise.

I tore through Leave Me in about two days. It’s eminently readable, super fast and engaging, and held my interest even when my body was telling me to put down my Kindle and just go to sleep.

But as I said, it’s not all a positive for me. As entertained as I was by much of the story, I just couldn’t buy it. Why would Maribeth see leaving her children as her best and only option? How could she leave and never even call? And how on earth was her husband so understanding and supportive when they finally did start emailing and speaking a month later? I’m sorry, but I think 99.9% of spouses left in that kind of situation would be absolutely furious, not conciliatory and reminiscing about the early days when they fell in love.

I mean, for goddess’s sake (just kidding, I’m not religious or pagan or anything other than a geek), she completely dropped out of communication less than a month after having open-heart surgery! For all her family knew, she could be dead in a ditch somewhere.

I just kept thinking — not cool, lady. Not cool. At least let someone know you’re alive.

A smaller quibble is just how easily her life worked in Pittsburgh. She came armed with loads of cash (ah, privilege!), but basically showed up empty-handed in a strange town — and found neighbors who took to her immediately and wanted to help her, a doctor who wanted to treat her when no one else would look past her unwillingness to share any information about her identity (or even health insurance), and a new friend who’s able to unlock all of the secrets about her birth mother (and teach her to swim). She didn’t encounter hostility, or mean people, or really, even indifference. It’s a nice little fairy tale, I suppose, to think that you can show up in a new city like that and find a life, but real? No.

On top of which, by the time she goes home months later, nothing has actually changed in terms of their stressful life. I mean yes, supposedly her husband and friend/boss are ready to be more supportive and are full of warm fuzzies, but she’s still going back to a super stressful Manhattan life that they can’t really afford, where she may or may not still have a job, and where they’re constantly under pressure. So even though she’s come to some big realizations about herself, what will actually be different when she gets back?

So yeah, despite loving the writing and feeling very amused and engaged by the book, some little part of my brain was sitting to the side judging and doubting, and that kept me just distant enough to feel like the plot doesn’t really hold up to scrutiny.

Should you read the book? Well, if you enjoy contemporary adult fiction, modern urban characters, and don’t mind pieces that could (or should) never happen in real life, then yes! You won’t be bored.

Meanwhile, I’ll just add that I’ve read four young adult books by Gayle Forman, and thought they were all great. (I especially loved Just One Day and Just One Year). So I was really excited to hear that the author would be releasing her first book for adults, Leave Me. And even though I don’t consider Leave Me a complete success, I did enjoy reading it and hope that she continues writing for adults. I’d love to see what she comes up with next!

I’ll leave you with a selection of some of my favorite passages from Leave Me:

She looked at the label on her yogurt. Was it full-fat yogurt? Had she been eating full-fat yogurt all this time? She scanned the package for the words, full fat, or whole milk, some kind of ominous cigarette-label warning that the contents might cause death. But she found nothing like that. The label only said it was French.

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Her birth mother had always been a shadowy, abstract figure. Maybe she was out there, maybe she wasn’t, but there was no way of knowing so why bother obsessing about it. It was not unlike how Maribeth felt about God. She supposed this made her birth-mother agnostic.

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Sometimes she really did think her heart no longer functioned. Sure, the muscle beat fine, but the feeling part of it was completely damaged.

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But it was the swimming pool in the basement that called to her. She wasn’t sure why but it felt like this, more than an elliptical machine or a vinyasa class, would ease the itchiness that was growing inside of her. Swimming felt new. Or maybe it was because she was sinking and wanted to see whether, if forced to, she might swim.

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The details:

Title: Leave Me
Author: Gayle Forman
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Publication date: September 6, 2016
Length: 352 pages
Genre: Adult contemporary fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley

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Take A Peek Book Review: Etta and Otto and Russell and James by Emma Hooper

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“Take a Peek” book reviews are short and (possibly) sweet, keeping the commentary brief and providing a little peek at what the book’s about and what I thought.

Etta & Otto

Synopsis:

(via Goodreads)

Eighty-three-year-old Etta has never seen the ocean. So early one morning she takes a rifle, some chocolate, and her best boots and begins walking the 3,232 kilometers from rural Saskatchewan, Canada eastward to the sea. As Etta walks further toward the crashing waves, the lines among memory, illusion, and reality blur.

Otto wakes to a note left on the kitchen table. “I will try to remember to come back,” Etta writes to her husband. Otto has seen the ocean, having crossed the Atlantic years ago to fight in a far-away war. He understands. But with Etta gone, the memories come crowding in and Otto struggles to keep them at bay. Meanwhile, their neighbor Russell has spent his whole life trying to keep up with Otto and loving Etta from afar. Russell insists on finding Etta, wherever she’s gone. Leaving his own farm will be the first act of defiance in his life.

Moving from the hot and dry present of a quiet Canadian farm to a dusty, burnt past of hunger, war, and passion, from trying to remember to trying to forget, Etta and Otto and Russell and James is an astounding literary debut “of deep longing, for reinvention and self-discovery, as well as for the past and for love and for the boundless unknown” (San Francisco Chronicle). “In this haunting debut, set in a starkly beautiful landscape, Hooper delineates the stories of Etta and the men she loved (Otto and Russell) as they intertwine through youth and wartime and into old age. It’s a lovely book you’ll want to linger over” (People).

 

My Thoughts:

Etta and Otto and Russell and James feels as familiar as an old shoe… and that’s both good and bad. There’s a heart-warming, comforting tone to it, and much of the story is told throughout flashbacks and interwoven memories. E&O&R&J seems to be one of several books recently about an elderly main character embarking on a sudden adventure or doing something completely out of character. I was reminded most forcefully of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce, but that’s not the only example.

In this book, main character Etta wakes up one day and starts walking, setting off on an easterly course from Saskatchewan in order to see the ocean, which she’s never seen before. She walks all day long, every day, sleeping outdoors and bathing in rivers, with only a coyote for company. The coyote (James) talks, by the way — or at least, Etta believes he does. Magical elements come into play, although I suppose they could also be signs of Etta’s growing forgetfulness and dementia. She carries a fish skull, a token of her childhood, which gives her advice in French.

Meanwhile, Otto stays home waiting for Etta to return, and to stay busy, he teaches himself to bake and makes an entire papier-mâché menagerie. The third human of the title, Russell, a farmer who has spent his long life at home, sets out to find Etta and then to find himself.

Some of the most affecting portions of the story are the chapters and interludes in which we learn more about Otto’s childhood — one of fifteen children on a dusty farm, where attending school every other day in order to carry out chores at home is simply a fact of rural life — and see the complicated interconnections between Otto, Russell, and Etta. We learn, too, about Otto’s wartime experiences, which seem to have crept over into Etta’s own memories and dreams.

E&O&R&J is highly readable, and I enjoyed the light-handed touch applied by the author to even weighty scenes and subjects. However, the magical elements felt a little awkward and out of place to me, and of course Etta’s entire journey is basically impossible to believe… which I guess opens up other lines of thought, such as did her walk actually happen at all, or, like her dreams, is this a seemingly physical experience that’s actually something she’s experiencing vividly within her own head?

My favorites sections in the book are those that deal with the war, with the courtship, and with life on the family farm. The story unfolds in bits and pieces, with a fluid timeline that jumps back and forth, sometimes from page to page. Overall, it is both a sad and entertaining read, and I enjoyed this not-quite-real tale about dreams, disappointments, and the idea that it’s never too late for a life to take an unexpected turn.

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The details:

Title: Etta and Otto and Russell and James
Author: Emma Hooper
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Publication date: January 1, 2014
Length: 336 pages
Genre: Adult fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley (and later, a used paperback bought at a library sale!)

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Book Review: To the Bright Edge of the World by Eowyn Ivey

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Bright Edge

Set again in the Alaskan landscape that she bought to stunningly vivid life in THE SNOW CHILD, Eowyn Ivey’s new novel is a breathtaking story of discovery and adventure, set at the end of the nineteenth century, and of a marriage tested by a closely held secret.

Colonel Allen Forrester receives the commission of a lifetime when he is charged to navigate Alaska’s hitherto impassable Wolverine River, with only a small group of men. The Wolverine is the key to opening up Alaska and its huge reserves of gold to the outside world, but previous attempts have ended in tragedy.

For Forrester, the decision to accept this mission is even more difficult, as he is only recently married to Sophie, the wife he had perhaps never expected to find. Sophie is pregnant with their first child, and does not relish the prospect of a year in a military barracks while her husband embarks upon the journey of a lifetime. She has genuine cause to worry about her pregnancy, and it is with deep uncertainty about what their future holds that she and her husband part.

A story shot through with a darker but potent strand of the magic that illuminated THE SNOW CHILD, and with the sweep and insight that characterised Rose Tremain’s The Colour, this new novel from Pulitzer Prize finalist Eowyn Ivey singles her out as a major literary talent.

I’m a bit of an Alaska geek, and one of the ways that comes out is that I’m inordinately excited whenever great new fiction set in Alaska appears on the horizon. So you can imagine how thrilled I was to get my hands on a copy of Eowyn Ivey’s newest book — I think I snagged the very first copy that arrived at my local library!

To the Bright Edge of the World is a novel told in letters and other first-person written documents, with occasional archival pieces such as newspaper clippings, photos, and maps mixed in as well. The main writings in this novel are journal entries by Colonel Allen Forrester and Sophie Forrester.

Allen is leading a small team of men up the dangerous and uncharted Wolverine River, with the goal of finding a passage through to the Yukon River. Previous expeditions have met disaster along the way and have been forced to abandon the attempt. Sophie is dismayed at the prospect of being left behind in the army barracks — she’d originally intended to journey to the starting point of the expedition with Allen, but the unexpected news of her pregnancy forces her to abandon that plan.

Sophie is a bright, energetic young woman who has no interest in or patience for the small, suffocating social circle of officers’ wives that seems to be her expected occupation while Allen is away. Sophie is fascinated by the natural world, and almost accidentally discovers an interest in photography. After a tragedy leaves her at loose ends, she purchases a camera, converts a room in her quarters into a dark room, and sets out to capture her concept of light through the photography of the wild birds in the area, with the elusive hummingbird as her true target.

Meanwhile, Allen’s expedition is beset by challenges and hardships at every turn, from starvation to injury to the delicate task of asking the local tribes for assistance without being seen as enemies. Through it all, Allen and Sophie record their thoughts, hopes, and emotions, as well as their daily activities, in their journals. The picture that emerges is of two highly intelligent people who, despite seeming an odd match, are truly suited to each other in a way that’s rare and beautiful.

The writing in To the Bright Edge of the World is lovely. The author captures the different writing styles and voices of the different characters, giving a unique flavor to the documents each writes. The descriptions of the landscapes and natural wonders is powerful, as are the thoughts and reflections on what it means to love another person, heart and soul.

There is yet another element to the book, which is the sense of the unexplained and magical that lives in the natural world. As Allen’s small team progresses, they encounter things they cannot explain, including an Old Man who also appears to be a raven, who follows them along their path — either to hurt or to help, they can’t be quite sure. Other magical, otherworldly elements come into play, and it’s interesting to note that while Allen records them all in his journals, the official reports of the expedition most certainly do not include these stories and observations.

Meanwhile, the framing device of the novel is a series of letters between an old man, a great-nephew of Colonel Forrester, and the curator of a small Alaskan musuem, as they get to know one another and form an odd friendship as they bond over the treasure trove of documents and artifacts from the family attic — the documents that make up the bulk of the novel.

While I loved the characters, the setting, and the imagery, I do have some minor quibbles. My biggest quibble is the limiting effect of telling a story through documents rather than a direct narrative. While this gives us insight into the characters’ thoughts, it’s by necessity not the most immediate way of depicting the events. Instead of experiencing the most dramatic moments as if we were there, we’re held at arms’ length by reading about the events as the narrators remember and record them. The epistolary approach works in terms of letting us inside the characters’ heads, but it’s a distancing tool when it comes to living and breathing big adventures as they happen.

Likewise, because of the epistolary approach, the supporting characters are known only by the main characters’ observations. I would have liked to know more about what makes certain characters tick, especially the soldiers in Allen’s company and the young native woman who accompanies them, but I felt that we never truly get beyond their outward appearances. (Of course, this is actually rather true to life — how do we get to know anyone, except by what they show us? It’s only in books that we get to know another person’s innermost thoughts.)

I question too the inclusion of the scattered photos, drawings, etc that pop up throughout the book. It felt to me as if they were included rather haphazardly — if the decision was made to augment the story with these types of things, then there should have been more. I actually love seeing the old photos (as if they were truly the products of the fictional characters in the story), but I would have liked a stronger commitment to this approach. Either go for it, or leave them out!

The quibble about the writing style is what keeps this from being a five-star read for me, but overall, I do think the book is a wonderful achievement and hope that it will be widely read and appreciated. Sophie is a remarkable woman, well ahead of her time, and I admired her pioneering spirit and commitment to her dreams, and absolutely love how she and Allen support each other and refuse to be boxed in by the traditional ideas of a proper marriage at that time.

To the Bright Edge of the World is a beautifully written historical novel with well-developed characters and an  unforgettable setting. If you enjoy historical fiction or even just have a hankering for Alaska, check it out.

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The details:

Title: To the Bright Edge of the World
Author: Eowyn Ivey
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Publication date: August 2, 2016
Length: 432 pages
Genre: Historical fiction
Source: Library

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Take A Peek Book Review: The Accident by Chris Pavone

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“Take a Peek” book reviews are short and (possibly) sweet, keeping the commentary brief and providing a little peek at what the book’s about and what I thought.

The Accident2

Synopsis:

(via Goodreads)

As dawn approaches in New York, literary agent Isabel Reed is turning the final pages of a mysterious, anonymous manuscript, racing through the explosive revelations about powerful people, as well as long-hidden secrets about her own past. In Copenhagen, veteran CIA operative Hayden Gray, determined that this sweeping story be buried, is suddenly staring down the barrel of an unexpected gun. And in Zurich, the author himself is hiding in a shadowy expat life, trying to atone for a lifetime’s worth of lies and betrayals with publication of The Accident, while always looking over his shoulder.

Over the course of one long, desperate, increasingly perilous day, these lives collide as the book begins its dangerous march toward publication, toward saving or ruining careers and companies, placing everything at risk—and everyone in mortal peril.  The rich cast of characters—in publishing and film, politics and espionage—are all forced to confront the consequences of their ambitions, the schisms between their ideal selves and the people they actually became.

The action rockets around Europe and across America, with an intricate web of duplicities stretching back a quarter-century to a dark winding road in upstate New York, where the shocking truth about the accident itself is buried.

Gripping, sophisticated, layered, and impossible to put down, The Accident proves once again that Chris Pavone is a true master of suspense.

 

My Thoughts:

“Impossible to put down” is exactly right. This spy thriller is off-beat, unusual, and deceptively layered. I expected a certain type of story, but The Accident keeps growing and twisting and taking off in all sorts of unexpected directions.

Who would have thought that an anonymous manuscript could set off an international hunt and race against the clock? With altered identities, murder, surveillance, and high-stakes chases, the manuscript sets off ripples not just in the publishing world, but in corporate headquarters and secret intelligence organizations around the globe.

I read this book on vacation, and it was a perfect choice for lazy reading on a lounge chair with a cold drink in hand. It requires attention, but goes very quickly, and isn’t something that’s going to ruin your happy mood or keep you obsessed while you should be thinking about other things.

This is the second novel by author Chris Pavone, and there is some carry-over from his first, The Expats, as well as characters who appear in his next, The Travelers. I read this one out of order, and realized there were connections I’d missed in The Travelers because I hadn’t read The Accident first. It doesn’t matter a great deal, though. You can enjoy enjoy each novel completely on its own — but reading all three in the order of publication makes it all the more fun, seeing familiar names and places and making connections.

This is a great escapist adventure read — check it out!

Want to know more about this author’s books? Check out my reviews of his other works:
The Expats
The Travelers

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The details:

Title: The Accident
Author: Chris Pavone
Publisher: Crown
Publication date: March 1, 2014
Length: 381 pages
Genre: Spy thriller
Source: Purchased

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Take A Peek Book Review: Before the Fall by Noah Hawley

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“Take a Peek” book reviews are short and (possibly) sweet, keeping the commentary brief and providing a little peek at what the book’s about and what I thought.Before the Fall

Synopsis:

(via Goodreads)

On a foggy summer night, eleven people—ten privileged, one down-on-his-luck painter—depart Martha’s Vineyard on a private jet headed for New York. Sixteen minutes later, the unthinkable happens: the plane plunges into the ocean. The only survivors are Scott Burroughs—the painter—and a four-year-old boy, who is now the last remaining member of an immensely wealthy and powerful media mogul’s family.

With chapters weaving between the aftermath of the crash and the backstories of the passengers and crew members—including a Wall Street titan and his wife, a Texan-born party boy just in from London, a young woman questioning her path in life, and a career pilot—the mystery surrounding the tragedy heightens. As the passengers’ intrigues unravel, odd coincidences point to a conspiracy. Was it merely by dumb chance that so many influential people perished? Or was something far more sinister at work? Events soon threaten to spiral out of control in an escalating storm of media outrage and accusations. And while Scott struggles to cope with fame that borders on notoriety, the authorities scramble to salvage the truth from the wreckage.

Amid pulse-quickening suspense, the fragile relationship between Scott and the young boy glows at the heart of this stunning novel, raising questions of fate, human nature, and the inextricable ties that bind us together.

My Thoughts:

Wow, what a thrill-ride! Although choosing to start this book the night before a long plane trip was maybe not the brightest idea I’ve every had.

In Before the Fall, the story starts almost immediately with the terror of the crash, and then the miracle of Scott’s long swim to safety, saving his own life as well as that of one small boy. But that’s only the beginning — from here, the author takes a post-mortem approach, giving us chapters focusing on each of the people on board the small plane, so that we see how the pieces fit together. Was it mechanical failure? Something deliberate? And if it was deliberate, who was the intended target?

The storyline shows Scott’s growing closeness to the surviving child, the intensity of the government agents investigating the crash, and the firestorm of media attention and sensationalism that soon follows. The chapters focusing on the different characters and their backstories are fascinating, always leaving me wanting more.

Overall, Before the Fall is a gripping read that builds and builds. It’s tense, well-constructed, hard to predict, and surprising in all the right ways. The characters are well-defined, so much so that it’s hard to approach the end of the story and realize that these people — good and bad, all flawed, almost none irredeemable — are doomed to the end that we knew about from the start.

It’s a pretty neat trick, telling us up front that all of these characters have died, and then taking the time to let us get to know them. Somehow, the tragedy of their senseless deaths is all the more striking with this backwards approach. Meanwhile, Scott’s story is compelling and sympathetic. It’s hard to see a decent man caught up in the tabloid frenzy that follows the crash, but how Scott manages is pretty good stuff too.

Before the Fall is a great summer read — quick, absorbing, and impossible not to care about.

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The details:

Title: Before the Fall
Author: Noah Hawley
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Publication date: May 31, 2016
Length: 391 pages
Genre: Adult fiction
Source: Purchased (e-book)

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Audiobook Review: Agent To The Stars by John Scalzi

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Agent to the Stars

 

The space-faring Yherajk have come to Earth to meet us and to begin humanity’s first interstellar friendship. There’s just one problem: They’re hideously ugly and they smell like rotting fish. So getting humanity’s trust is a challenge. The Yherajk need someone who can help them close the deal. Enter Thomas Stein, who knows something about closing deals. He’s one of Hollywood’s hottest young agents. But although Stein may have just concluded the biggest deal of his career, it’s quite another thing to negotiate for an entire alien race. To earn his percentage this time, he’s going to need all the smarts, skills, and wits he can muster.

Agent to the Stars is John Scalzi’s first novel, but you’d never know it. It’s hilarious. And wonderful. And just so perfectly entertaining.

A heavy-duty reflection on the nature of humanity… is not what this is. Instead, it’s a fast-paced, in-your-face, silly look at the world of Hollywood, the art of the deal… and aliens.

In this case, very smelly aliens. The Yherajk communicate via smell, so attending one of their senior officers meetings onboard their space ship is likely to make a human vomit or pass out. And yet, they’re a peaceful race with advanced intelligence and technology, and they just want to get to know us.

Agent 2Tom Stein is placed in the once-in-a-lifetime position of being the man chosen to introduce an entire race to humanity. As a Hollywood agent, Tom is an expert when it comes to making something attractive, garnering attention, and making people want more. But how to package and promote a species that looks like blobs of goo? With Yherajk representative Joshua designated as Tom’s personal liaison, things go from weird to unbelieavably weird in a flash, and meanwhile, Tom is still trying to place his of-the-moment hot actress into the dramatic role of a lifetime.

To say any more would be to ruin the fun. In case I haven’t made it perfectly clear, this is not at all a serious book. As an audiobook, it suited my needs to a T. Light and breezy, it’s a perfect listen for when you don’t need to engage a lot of brain cells. I can definitely attest to the fact that this audiobook made for a great couple of weeks of commuting.

Narrator Wil Wheaton takes the crazy imagination of John Scalzi and turns it into a wild and hilarious performance that’s silly and light, and yet with some surprisingly touching moments too. Such fun. If your sense of humor runs toward goofy and you enjoy wholly unusual sci-fi plots (with smelly aliens), don’t miss this book!

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The details:

Title: Agent To The Stars
Author: John Scalzi
Narrator: Wil Wheaton
Publisher: Subterranean Press
Publication date: 2004
Audiobook length: 8 hours, 49 minutes
Printed book length: 363 pages
Genre: Science fiction
Source: Purchased

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Vacation reading wrap-up

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I just spend a glorious 10 days on vacation! Glorious, because VACATION. Also glorious, because my husband and I traveled to two beautiful southern cities, Savannah, Georgia and Charleston, South Carolina, ending with a few days of utter relaxation at Hilton Head Island, doing not much more than sitting on beach chairs, wading in the ocean, and basking in the sun.

Oh, and did I mention reading? Because I did a little reading. Enough to cause darling hubby to shake his head at me a few times and lovingly call me ridiculous.

Here’s a quick wrap-up of what I read on vacation, with my take on the vacation-worthiness of each book. The number of little beach umbrellas reflects my own personal feelings about whether or not this is a good choice for tucking into your beach-tote!

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RainwaterRainwater by Sandra Brown: Set during the Depression in drought-stricken Texas, this is the story of a single mother who runs a boarding house while caring for her autistic son, and the stranger who comes to stay and ends up changing both of their lives. I’ll admit that I never would have picked this up if it weren’t my book group’s pick for July. It looks and feels like the kind of book you’d pick up in a supermarket check-out line. That said, I was surprisingly engrossed by the story. Rainwater‘s depiction of the historical setting was very interesting, and I learned a few things about the time period that were completely new to me. That may make the book sound stuffy, and it’s not. The love story is sweet and passionate and unexpected, includes some strong commentary on social justice issues, and has an ending at once tragic and uplifting. The writing isn’t exactly literary, but it’s a quick and compelling read.

Vacation rating:  umbrellaumbrellaumbrellaumbrella

 

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Liam1Liam2Fire and Ice and So Sure of Death, books 1 & 2 in the Liam Campbell series by Dana Stabenow. Big surprise for anyone who reads my blog from time to time — I’m a huge fan of Dana Stabenow’s Kate Shugak series, and have gotten far enough into that series that I needed to detour into her related series about Alaska State Trooper Liam Campbell. The Liam books did not let me down in the slightest, and are perfect vacation reads: Fast-paced, great characters, unusual settings, mysteries that kept me engaged, and personal relationships that are fresh, believable, and utterly engaging.

Vacation rating:  umbrellaumbrellaumbrellaumbrellaumbrella

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Sandcastle GirlsThe Sandcastle Girls by Chris Bohjalian: This is a heartbreaker of a story, a historical novel focusing on the Armenian genocide of 1915, as seen through the eyes of a young American woman who travels to Aleppo to offer aid and assistance to survivors. Elizabeth’s eyes are opened by the horrors she witnesses, while at the same time, she discovers love in a most unexpected place. The historical elements are framed by a modern-day woman’s exploration of her grandparents’ histories. The modern-day story felt more like a distraction to me, as what really gripped me was the story of Elizabeth, Armen, and the other supporting characters we meet in 1915. The Sandcastle Girls is powerful, beautiful, and devastating, and is a must-read — and yet, I don’t think I’d recommend it as a vacation read. It’s an amazing book, don’t get me wrong, and I think everyone should read it — but the seriousness of the subject matter and the unrelenting suffering portrayed here don’t jibe very well with beach umbrellas, flip-flops, and cold fruity cocktails. Read this book — but read it at home.

Vacation rating:  umbrellaumbrella

 

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Crooked HeartCrooked Heart by Lissa Evans tells the story of a young boy evacuated from London during WWII. Noel is an odd little duck, and when his eccentric godmother/guardian dies, he’s left without a soul to care for him. Vee is a con woman who schemes to earn a little cash because she really has no other way of supporting her deadbeat son and her doddering mother. Vee takes Noel in so that she can collect the fostering fee for housing evacuees, but the two soon find that his brains combined with her slippery ethics make for successful money-making. This is an unusual and offbeat story, with a lot of charm, plenty of humor, and lots of heart-tugging sentiment too. The historical setting is nicely conveyed, and the mood is sincere and sometimes sad, but never so heavy as to make reading it a drag. I definitely recommend the book, and I enjoyed it while swinging in a hammock.

Vacation rating:  umbrellaumbrellaumbrellaumbrella

 

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Long Walk2The Long Walk by Stephen King: Ooooh. This is a good one. I’d never heard of this book, one of King’s earlier works (written under his Richard Bachman pseudonym), until I saw Bonnie’s review on For the Love of Words (check it out here — great review!). In The Long Walk, 100 teen-aged boys participate in a walk that continues until only one is left standing… because all the others are dead. The boys start at the Maine/Canada border, and walk. That’s it. They walk — and walk, and walk, never falling below a 4-mile-per-hour pace, because if they do, that’s a warning. And after three warnings, the next infraction means you’re shot to death by the armed guards who travel alongside the walkers. The boys never stop, not to eat, sleep, or pee. If they fall or pass out or get a cramp, that could mean the end. Wow, is this a disturbing book, and yet it’s so, so good. Meanwhile, the boys who walk talk and reflect and learn the truth hidden inside the deepest, darkest corners of their hearts and minds. Why they walk is only explained at a surface level (there’s a Prize), but it’s clear without ever being explicitly shown that this is an alternate version of the United States in which watching a group of boys walk to death is high entertainment, and which is bleak enough that the 1 in 100 shot at the Prize is enough to get more or less sensible boys to bet their lives.

You might think that all this makes The Long Walk too dark for a vacation read… but no. Stephen King is pretty much always perfect for vacation. The fast-paced storytelling and immersive experience makes you happy to glance up and see the sun still shining. It’s horror, but (oh, this makes me sound like a bad person) totally fun horror.

Vacation rating:  umbrellaumbrellaumbrellaumbrellaumbrella

 

sun-151763_1280Blue AsylumBlue Asylum by Kathy Hepinstall: I loved this book! Set during the Civil War, this historical novel tells the story of Iris Dunleavy, a young woman who somewhat blindly enters into a marriage with a plantation owner, only to realize that his cruelty is more than she can bear. When she attempts to expose his crimes, he instead has her declared insane and sends her away to an island asylum to be “cured” of her irrational defiance and delusions. While there, Iris meets Ambrose, a Confederate soldier haunted by his wartime experience. Iris and Ambrose fall in love, but Iris’s determination to escape with her lover and start a new life is doomed from the start. It’s a haunting and tragic love story, beautifully written, with an unusual setting and a memorable and well-defined cast of supporting characters. I just adored this one. Sad? Yes. And still, I consider it a great vacation read. The asylum is set on Sanibel Island off the coast of Florida, and the descriptions of the beaches, sea, birds, and sky give Blue Asylum a feeling of sunshine and freshness, even when the plot makes me want to cry.

Vacation rating:  umbrellaumbrellaumbrellaumbrellaumbrella

 

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And that’s my vacation reading wrap-up! As you can see, I read some amazing books — not all are books I’d describe as beach reads, but not a single dud among the bunch.

If I had to pick one to recommend the most, I’d say definitely check out Blue Asylum. For anyone who loves historical fiction, powerful love stories, and strong female lead characters, this is a can’t-miss book.

Book Review: Defending Taylor by Miranda Kenneally

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defending taylorMiranda Kenneally’s newest book set in Tennessee (part of her Hundred Oaks series) is, as expected, an unusually fine example of thoughtful and smart young adult writing.

In Defending Taylor, Taylor Lukens is the hard-working, hard-playing daughter of a US Senator, on her way to Yale if she can just get that early admission essay done — when her life falls apart. After attending an upscale, exclusive boarding school for years, where she maintains a 4.2 GPA while starring on the soccer team, Taylor is suddenly expelled and forced to live at home with her parents again while finishing out senior year at Hundred Oaks, the local public school.

What went wrong? Taylor’s boyfriend Ben is from a poor family and attended St. Andrews on scholarship. When Taylor is found by the dorm monitors with a backpack containing pills and weed, she claims it’s hers, figuring that her dad’s clout will get her out of trouble. Wrong. Taylor’s dad won’t lift a finger to save her from the consequences of her supposed drug dealing, other than to have her attend public school with mandatory counseling rather than face any legal action. What no one knows is that the backpack was actually Ben’s, and Taylor covered for him to keep him from getting kicked out. Her heart is broken and she feels utterly betrayed when he doesn’t step forward once the consequences become clear… so not only is Taylor forced to attend an inferior school with an inferior soccer team, but her relationship is over as well.

Fitting in at a new school is hard at first, but Taylor is 100% focused on the future she’s been groomed for all her life. Highest grades, top-notch soccer career, impressive extracurriculars, then onward to Yale and a place in the family’s investment firm. Is this what she really wants? It doesn’t matter — it’s what’s expected.

Defending Taylor gives us an inside look at what happens when someone’s ambitions and someone’s heart lie in two different directions. Taylor’s parents are completely focused on politics and her father’s reeelection campaign, and there’s little time or patience for a daughter who suddenly veers off the path of high achievement and respectability. Taylor faces a senior year with no friends and the daily frustration of a poorly organized soccer team where the domineering captain resents her. Fortunately for Taylor, she does have one ally — her older brother’s best friend Ezra, inexplicably back home rather than away at Cornell where he’s supposed to be. Taylor and Ezra have always had chemistry, and when they start spending time together again, sparks fly.

I always enjoy Miranda Kenneally’s depictions of teen love. She doesn’t shy away from complicated emotions, and while the sex is a touch more explicit than in other contemporary YA novels I’ve read, it feels realistic and empowered (and safe — the characters always stop for a condom). Family dynamics are complicated as well. Being rich doesn’t necessarily mean happy, and the town and the school present a cross-section of different economic statuses.

The message in Defending Taylor has a lot to do with honesty — being honest with oneself, and being honest with the people who love you. Taylor hides the truth for so long from her family, afraid to be a snitch but at the same time suffering terribly from the ruined reputation she endures once word gets out about her supposed drug use. Meanwhile, she’s also never admitted to her parents, or even to herself, that Yale and investment banking might be the family tradition, but might not be her own true path. On top of the honesty theme, there’s also an ongoing message about stress, pressure, and having fun. Taylor’s guidance counselor asks Taylor what she does for fun, and she’s pretty stumped. Fun? School, soccer, studying all night — Taylor’s life is non-stop pressure, from herself as well as from her family, and she doesn’t even realize how unhealthy it is until she’s forced to take a hard look at her life, once it becomes clear that her hard work still might not be enough to overcome scandal and disgrace.

Probably the only bit of this otherwise terrific story that seemed a little off to me had to do with her father’s campaign. When someone leaks the news about Taylor’s expulsion from boarding school for having prescription drugs in her possession that weren’t prescribed for her, it creates a scandal that ultimately costs her father the election. And I couldn’t help but feel… really?? The man has been a Senator for years, has been a successful politician for years more, has a family that’s always been upstanding and has two older kids who have exemplary behavior… and he loses an election because his 17-year-old had a lapse of judgement? Seems like a very lame reason for someone who was supposed to win easily to suddenly lose an election. But what do I know? This is Tennessee, and the politics trend toward conservative, so maybe that could be enough to sink the career of an anti-drug legislator… but it felt unlikely to me.

Other than that, I truly enjoyed Defending Taylor. I liked Taylor’s backbone and self-sufficiency, her dedication to her own success, and her underlying belief in treating others with decency. She’s clearly a very good friend, and becomes a unifying force on her soccer team once she earns the other girls’ trust with her positive energy. Taylor’s relationship with Ezra is hot and steamy, but founded on mutual friendship and liking, not just hormones.

It’s not necessary to have read the other Hundred Oaks books to enjoy Defending Taylor, but for those who have, you’ll enjoy the little glimpses of characters from previous books. You can really start with any of the books in the series — and if you like one, give a few others a try. All feature strong, athletic girls who aren’t afraid to stand up for themselves, even while dealing with family complications of all shapes and sizes.

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The details:

Title: Defending Taylor
Author: Miranda Kenneally
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Publication date: July 5, 2016
Length: 304 pages
Genre: Young adult fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley

Take A Peek Book Review: The Japanese Lover by Isabel Allende

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“Take a Peek” book reviews are short and (possibly) sweet, keeping the commentary brief and providing a little peek at what the book’s about and what I thought.

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Synopsis:

(via Goodreads)

In 1939, as Poland falls under the shadow of the Nazis, young Alma Belasco’s parents send her away to live in safety with an aunt and uncle in their opulent mansion in San Francisco. There, as the rest of the world goes to war, she encounters Ichimei Fukuda, the quiet and gentle son of the family’s Japanese gardener. Unnoticed by those around them, a tender love affair begins to blossom. Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the two are cruelly pulled apart as Ichimei and his family, like thousands of other Japanese Americans are declared enemies and forcibly relocated to internment camps run by the United States government. Throughout their lifetimes, Alma and Ichimei reunite again and again, but theirs is a love that they are forever forced to hide from the world.

Decades later, Alma is nearing the end of her long and eventful life. Irina Bazili, a care worker struggling to come to terms with her own troubled past, meets the elderly woman and her grandson, Seth, at San Francisco’s charmingly eccentric Lark House nursing home. As Irina and Seth forge a friendship, they become intrigued by a series of mysterious gifts and letters sent to Alma, eventually learning about Ichimei and this extraordinary secret passion that has endured for nearly seventy years.

 

My Thoughts:

While The Japanese Lover tells what should be fascinating stories of suffering and survival, the key problem I had with it was the telling. As in, show — don’t tell. Somehow, most of the narrative of this novel felt like a third party summarizing events, rather than allowing me to witness events for myself. There are a lot of shared stories and memories, but they mostly lack immediacy or a sense of real texture.

Additionally, the overall storyline felt a bit kitchen-sinky to me. Alma is sent off to American by her parents who stay behind in Poland and perish in the Holocaust. Irina’s mother was a victim of sex trafficking and ultimately causes horrible abuse to Irina herself. Ichimei and his family are forced into an internment camp during World War II. Alma’s husband leads a closeted life and dies of AIDS. Horrible things happen, but somehow I barely felt any of them.

The Japanese Lover is a fast read, and parts were quite interesting, but I simply couldn’t engage emotionally with much of it due to the style of the storytelling. This was actually pretty surprising to me, as I’ve read and loved many books by this author in the past. The individual stories all should have been compelling, but the mashing up of them all into one novel just doesn’t work. Add to this the fact that Alma and Ichimei’s love story felt flat and unexciting, and I have to say that The Japanese Lover just isn’t the best example of an Isabel Allende novel.

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The details:

Title: The Japanese Lover
Author: Isabel Allende
Publisher: Atria
Publication date: November 3, 2015
Length: 322 pages
Genre: Historical fiction
Source: Purchased

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Book Review: One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid

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One True LovesEmma Blair had the great good fortune to meet her soulmate at age 17. Emma and Jesse fall madly in love, eventually get married, and escape their small New England town for a life full of adventure and travel. They seem destined for a perfect life. But the day before their first anniversary, on a work assignment, Jesse in lost in a deadly helicopter crash in the Pacific Ocean and presumed dead.

Emma’s world is shattered, and she believes she’ll never recover from her grief. Yet with time and with the support of her family, years pass, she recenters herself and finds a new purpose, and finally, meets an old friend with whom there’s an instant connection. With much soul-searching, Emma brings herself to a point in her life where she’s ready to love again. Emma and Sam are in love, and establish a home and a life together. They’re happy.

And then, as the very first line of the book tells us:

I am finishing up dinner with my family and my fiancé when my husband calls.

Jesse is alive, miraculously found again years after his supposedly fatal crash. Not just alive, but coming home. Seven weeks later, Jesse arrives back in Massachusetts after getting his strength back, desperate to reunite with Emma and pick up where they left off. And Emma is a complete mess. She loves Sam, but she loved Jesse with all her heart and soul for so long. If Jesse hadn’t disappeared, they’d certainly still be together. So what is Emma to do?

Jesse was her one true love — but so is Sam. She can’t imagine hurting either man, but she knows she has to choose. Every time she seems to realize which is the person she can’t do without, her heart breaks at the thought of giving up the other.

One True Loves is an emotional rocketship ride, from a powerful take-off through chapters and paragraphs that go zooming by, all the way to the dynamic ending. I read this book in the space of a single day, because I couldn’t stop reading until I knew how it all would work out. The writing just sucked me in as of the very first line, and I simply couldn’t look away.

There are no bad guys here. You can’t look at Jesse or Sam and say that either one is a better person or is more deserving of Emma’s love. In fact, the author makes sure that we see just how special they both are. It wouldn’t really be a dilemma if it was an easy choice. Jesse and Sam are both devoted to Emma, but each represents something very different to her.

The book doesn’t shy away from pain and grief. Emma doesn’t just get over Jesse. We see her torment and devastation, her craziness, her defeat. Grief is a process and there are no shortcuts, and nothing is prettied up here. So when Emma meets Sam and decides to try going on a date, it’s a huge step for her, and one we want her to take. She’s been to hell and back. The fact that she can finally imagine a fresh, new love in her life is amazing, and we readers want her to be happy.

The writing is quite beautiful, exploring Emma’s complicated emotions and thought-processes. Ultimately, she realizes that it’s not a contest between two men or a question of who she loves more. They’re each a part of her; she loves them differently, not more or less. The real issue for Emma is who she is. Being with Jesse and being with Sam represents two very different versions of her life. She’s changed over the years, partly because she was forced to, and partly because she found new meaning for herself. In choosing the man to spend her future with, she’s also deciding which version of herself she wants to keep and nurture.

My quibbles with this book are small and fairly unimportant. One, the title. One True Loves? I’m sorry, but that’s just awkward. I would have much preferred it as Two True Loves, which sounds better from a word-appreciation standpoint (One True Loves just doesn’t flow off the tongue), and also captures the essence of the story. But what do I know? I’m not an editor.

The other issue I have is a plot point (SPOILER ALERT!), so maybe it should feel more major — but I choose to accept is as what it is and not get too hung up on it. And that is — the whole question of Jesse’s survival. Have you seen the Tom Hanks movie Castaway? Okay, this is basically that, but without the volleyball. Jesse floats in a liferaft from the sea near the Aleutian Islands all the way to a small rocky islet in the Pacific near Midway, where he lives for years on fish and rainwater, until he finally swims his way into the path of a passing ship. Um, okay? Really, it’s not the slightest bit believable… but I’m looking at this whole story as a romantic fairy tale of sorts, not a gritty real-world drama. What are the odds of Jesse surviving and coming home again? Slim to none. But hey, the point of this book is not the survival story — it’s about the love stories and the individual choice that Emma makes. How the characters get to where they are is less important than what they do once they get there.

But back to the positive…

Besides the great love story (stories), something that Taylor Jenkins Reid excels at is depicting female relationships in a way that feels real, showing them in all their complicated wonderfulness. Emma’s best friend is Olive, and she’s just a total hoot. Their friendship is a constant in Emma’s life, and even though Olive is in the story as a supporting character, she’s got dimensions and personality that are funny and fully formed. Likewise, the portrayal of Emma’s relationship with her sister feels true to life. Emma and Marie have a pretty typical teen relationship, barely tolerating each other, but we get to see how their commitment and love as sisters matures as they do, until they finally have an adult relationship that’s incredibly close and important.

I’ve read one other book by this author, Maybe In Another Life (review), and loved it as well. Her love stories are emotional but not sappy, and her characters deal with real-life emotions and dilemmas, even in situations that have an element of the fantastical to them. I plan to track down her two earlier novels — I have a feeling Taylor Jenkins Reid is going to earn a place on my “read everything she writes” list!

Check out One True Loves if you enjoy compelling love stories, relatable characters, and interesting, unexpected plots. Since it’s June, I guess this is the right time to say that One True Loves would be a perfect beach read!

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The details:

Title: One True Loves
Author: Taylor Jenkins Reid
Publisher: Washington Square Press
Publication date: June 7, 2016
Length: 352 pages
Genre: Adult fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley

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