Fiction Review Catch-Up

The Women by Kristin Hannah

Rating: 4.0

Historical Fiction

A young nurse named Frankie follows her older brother to serve in Vietnam. She works in a front line makeshift hospital where she sees up close the brutality of war. There is friendship with other nurses, love with a soldier and a doctor, and a return to her country that rejects her and doesn't recognize the fact that she served.

I liked everything about this book except that there was a little too much drama in Frankie's life to seem realistic. Everything that could happen to a number of women serving in Vietnam happened to Frankie. 

Kristin Hannah is a great historical fiction writer. This book is a page turner. It is worth reading for the education on the Vietnam War, especially as it applied to women who served. 

The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese

Rating: 4.5

Literary Fiction

The Covenant of Water takes place in the Saint Thomas Christian Community in Kerala, India where three generations of a family suffer from a strange "condition" -- in each generation, at least one person will drown. The family tries to figure out the cause of the mysterious affliction. A secondary story about a Scottish surgeon who opens a leprosy sanctuary in Kerala was interesting too. 

This book is a commitment at 736 pages, but I would recommend it you like long family sagas.

Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon

Rating: 4.5

Historical Fiction

This book takes place in Maine around the year 1789. A midwife named Martha Ballard (she was a real person), is summoned as an medical expert in a suspected murder case when a body is found frozen in the river. Martha keeps a diary which proves useful in court. Martha was a compassionate midwife who tended to most of the women in small town. She was not afraid to speak up so that justice was served. Fast paced and very well written book.

Tom Lake by Ann Patchett

Rating: 4

Family Life Fiction

During the COVID quarantine in 2020, a mother of three adult daughters recounts the story of a summer in her youth spent performing stock theater in Michigan. While they harvested cherries on their family farm, she told them of the escapades of her relationship with a currently very famous movie star. It was a middle-aged woman's look back at what her life may have turned out to be as well as her decided contentment with the way things were.

James by Percival Everett

Rating: 4

Fiction: Satire

The slave (Jim) in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is re-imagined as an intelligent, learned man named James. When he makes his escape, he gets tangled up with Huck and they have to float down the Mississippi River together. They fear for their lives as they get into one mess after another. This was a very well-written book. The perspective of James gives you much to think about. I enjoyed this one.

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The Giver of Stars

 

Kendall chose the book for our Girls' One-Book-A-Year Book Club for 2024. The Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes was published in 2019 so it's been around for a few years. I had seen it many times but for some reason, I had never looked into what the book was about. I never would have guessed.

Jojo Moyes generally writes in the romance genre and this book did have some romance. It was about more than those relationships though. The book was based on the true story of the Packhorse Librarians of Kentucky. These brave women rode on horseback to deliver books to people in the mountains who would otherwise never have access to books. Sometimes the women would stay awhile and read to illiterate people. Packhorse Librarians were the Great Depression's Bookmobiles.

In 1930 up to 31 percent of people in eastern Kentucky could not read. The Packhorse Libary program was initiated under the New Deal's Work Program Administration (WPA). Carriers rode out at least twice a month, with each route covering 100-120 miles (Smithsonian).

The Giver of Stars was a combination of romance and historical fiction. All of us enjoyed reading the book and would recommend it. Under my rating system, I would give it a 4. 

The best part of reading the book was our dinner out for the book discussion! We left the kids (except Ezra) with the guys and went to 17 River Grille in Chagrin Falls on Friday night. Dinner was delicious and we had a great time. 

Because of construction and limited parking in the town we parked right in front of the Popcorn Shop. The shop was open after dinner so we went in and bought ice cream, popcorn, and Daisy Cake cake pops to take home.

The guys did a good job feeding the crew Chipotle for dinner, but their supervision skills need improvement. Dean and Marina had a ball upstairs by themselves. Apparently, they had a fashion show trying on clothes from my closet. After that, they pretended to have a sleepover inside the camping closet using my extra blankets and pillows. I still haven't figured out why the toilet paper and all the Q-tips were missing from the guest bathroom. Only Gavin and Ezra are innocent.

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Beyond That, the Sea

 

Beyond That, the Sea: A Novel by Laura Spence-Ash

Rating: 4.5

Historical Fiction

I knew that some children living in London during WWII were sent away from their parents to live in the countryside during the Blitz. The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis, is a children's book featuring Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie who went to live with Professor Digory Kirke in his large house during the war. What I didn't know was that approximately 5,000 children (some with guardians) were evacuated to the United States.

Beyond That, the Sea is the story of an 11-year-old girl named Beatrix Thompson whose parents felt she would be safer living with a family in America than staying in London in 1940. It was a heart-wrenching decision for them to part with their only child. 

Beatrix boarded a ship bound for Boston not knowing what she would find beyond the sea. Her hosts turned out to be the Gregory family which consisted of Mr. & Mrs. G. and their two sons, William (13) and Gerald (9). The book tells the story from eight different points of view - both sets of parents and each of the three children.

Five years later, the war is over and it is safe to return to London. By this time Beatrice (Bea) has come of age and is quite attached to the Gregory family. Travel between countries was not easy during this time so she knew she might never see them again.

This book is very well written and it kept me reading! Highly recommend it.

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The Remains of the Day

 

The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro

Rating: 5

Literary Fiction

The Remains of the Day was published in 1988 and was the winner of the Booker Prize in 1989. I don't know where it has been all my life but I am glad I finally found it. It was made into a film starring Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson (1993). Have you seen it? I now want to!

I read somewhere that this book was one of the major influences on Julian Fellowes as he developed the Downton Abbey series.

Mr. Stevens, an aging, long-time butler at Darlington Hall, is encouraged by his new employer (an American named Mr. Faraday) to take a road trip to get away on a vacation. After some consideration, Mr. Stevens decides to visit Miss Kenton, a former housekeeper who left 20 years earlier to get married. He had recently received a letter from her that made him think Miss Kenton might be willing to return to Darlington Hall.

Along the six-day motoring trip, Stevens makes several stops and reminisces about his career serving as Lord Darlington's butler. He considers how the role of dignity played a part in the lives of the finest butlers, including his own father. He looks back on his career and the choices he made to uphold his role. 

I'm surprised this book did not make me cry, but my heart was broken in a couple of places as I watched the fear of letting his guard down hold Stevens back from experiencing love.

A+ on this one.

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Hester

 

Hester by Laurie Lico Albanese

Rating: 4

Historical British & Irish Literature

It's been a few months since I posted a book review. I've been so busy I haven't had too much time to read. I plan to remedy that in 2024. Hester was my book group pick for October. 

It's not necessary to have read The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne before reading this book, but it does help to understand what is going on. In The Scarlet Letter, a woman named Hester Prynne conceives a child and is therefore found out in adultery. As punishment, she must wear a scarlet "A" for adultery in public. She refuses to out her accomplice, so he suffers silently. 

In Hester by Laurie Albanese, we get an imagined backstory and perspective of the adultress.  Isobel Gamble arrives in Massachusetts with her husband on a ship from Scotland. He is an apothecary who is addicted to opium and takes off, leaving her penniless. As a skilled seamstress, she is able to make enough to live on. As time goes by, she meets a young, married writer named Nathaniel Hawthorne. He's having writer's block until she inspires him. I'll leave it at that so I don't spoil the whole plot. 

I didn't give it 5 stars because I was a little annoyed with the way Nathaniel Hawthorne was portrayed in the book. Otherwise, it was very well done and worth a read.

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Love and Saffron

 

Love and Saffron: A Novel of Friendship, Food, and Love by Kim Fay

Rating: 4

Epistolary Fiction, Women's Friendship Fiction

"There is unequaled satisfaction in composing words on a blank page, sealing them in an envelope, writing an address in my own messy hand, adding a stamp, walking it to the mailbox, and raising the flag. It's like preparing a gift, and I feel like I receive one when a letter arrives --yours most of all."

That was one of my favorite quotes from Love and Saffron, a novel told in letters. The 1960s was a simpler time to live and that added to the specialness of this book. It reminded me a little of 84 Charring Cross Road by Helene Hanff.

Through correspondence, 27-year-old Joan, whose mother loves magazine subscriptions, and Mrs. Imogen Fortier, a writer for Northwest Home & Life, develop a friendship by discussing unique foods and recipes. It doesn't take long for them to begin writing about more personal events in their lives, and they become close friends.

I don't want to give away any spoilers, but I may have shed a few tears at the end. I only wish the book was three times as long.

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I Capture the Castle

 

I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith

Rating: 5

Coming-of-Age Fiction

First off, I must say, I loved this book! 

I Capture the Castle was written in 1948 by Dodie Smith who is best known for her book and the Disney movie 101 Dalmatians. There is nothing similar about these two stories.

This story is told by a 17-year-old narrator, Cassandra Mortmain, who fills three journals with her thoughts over a six-month period. She is writing in her journal partly to practice speed writing and partly to teach herself how to write a novel. 

At the start of her journal, the family is living in poverty in a run-down castle in Suffolk, England purchased by her father after some success in publishing his own book. But ever since then, he has had writer's block and has not been able to produce anything at all.

Twenty-one-year-old Rose, Cassandra's sister, is desperate to find a rich man to marry so that their family will be able to rise above their current circumstances. 

When two young men from America happen upon the castle one evening unexpectedly, the tide begins to turn. 

Cassandra's journals are thoughtful and honest, full of emotion, and sometimes laugh-out-loud funny. And sometimes they made me cry. That's my kind of book.

This would be a great summer read to immerse yourself in. You won't want it to end.

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Take My Hand

 

Take My Hand by Dolen Perkins Valdez

Rating: 4

Black & African American Historical Fiction

This story is loosely based on the real-life legal case of Relf v Weinberger that took place in 1973. Two sisters, ages 12 and 14, were sterilized without consent in Montgomery, Alabama. Upon investigation, it was learned that these illegal sterilizations of poor and mentally ill minors were taking place throughout the country. 

The main character, Civil Townsend, tells the story to her then-23-year-old adopted daughter as she bounces back and forth between 1973 and 2016. She was the nurse, working at a federally funded clinic, assigned to the sisters' case while the sterilization occurred. She had been visiting these two girls on a regular basis giving them birth control injections of a drug that she found out later was not yet federally regulated and could cause cancer.

This book would pair well with The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot or a book on the Tuskegee Syphilis Study.

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The Maid

 

The Maid by Nita Prose

Rating: 4

Murder Mystery

This was a gentle murder mystery - no blood, no gore, and no intense suspense. I think it would be considered what the book industry calls a "Cozy Mystery."

Molly Gray loved her job at the Regency Grand Hotel. She adored putting rooms back to a state of perfection after people checked out.  Even though she was 25 years old, her social skills and perceptions of life's situations made her seem much younger. She reminded me of Amelia Bedelia, the children's book character who took things quite literally.

In the course of her job one day, Molly discovers a dead body in one of the rooms she is cleaning. By putting her trust in friends who weren't really her friends, she becomes the primary suspect in the murder.

I enjoyed cheering for Molly to get out of the tangled web she was in. This was a debut novel. Worth a read.

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The Lost Apothecary

 

The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner

Rating: 4

Historical Fiction/Light Suspense

Our January book club selection was Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng. Since I had read and enjoyed her other two books (Everything I Never Told You and Little Fires Everywhere), I thought I would like her newest novel. Not so. I started it three times and never got past page 50 before giving up. It was a DNF for me and I felt bad about that at book club.

All that to say, The Lost Apothecary is our February pick, so I got on it right away. Turns out I liked it a lot. The storyline propelled me to the end.

This novel, set in London, has two parallel timelines. One takes place in 1791 and the other in the present day. The chapters go back and forth between three women: Caroline, an American tourist who finds an antique jar on a "mud larking" outing;  Nella, a middle-aged woman who runs a secret apothecary shop; and Eliza, a 12-year-old housemaid who inadvertently gets tangled up in a mess.

I enjoyed the storyline that took place in 1791 better than the one in the present day, but it was interesting to see how the two intertwined. This was a well-done novel for a debut author.

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Small Things Like These

 

Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan

Rating: 5

Literary Fiction

This was the perfect little book to read around Christmas time. It is a 128-page quiet story that really packs a punch. Claire Keegan is an Irish author. This book made the Booker Prize shortlist for 2022.

Small Things Like These is set in 1985 (surprisingly) in a small Irish town leading up to Christmas. It is told from the perspective of a middle-aged coal and timber merchant, Bill Furlong, who is going about his business when he makes a discovery about the home for unwed mothers run by the Catholic church convent. 

While making a delivery, he is horrified to discover girls the same age as his own daughters being treated like slaves. These things are known by the clergy, but a blind eye is turned. 

Bill cannot unsee what he saw. He cannot stop thinking about one girl in particular. All these things make him think about his own childhood being raised by an unwed mother himself. If it hadn't been for the wealthy woman in town who took her and Bill in, his mother could have been one of these girls.

You can read this book in about an hour. It is so worth it. It makes you think about noticing and doing something about what you notice. Highly recommend.

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The Violin Conspiracy

 

The Violin Consipiracy by Brendan Slocumb

Rating: 4

Mystery and Suspense

A talented black violinist growing up in rural North Carolina doesn't think he has much of a chance to succeed in the world of music. But a college professor sees potential in him and takes him under her wing. At the same time, Ray finds out that the beat-up violin his grandmother gave him is actually a Stradivarius worth $10,000,000. As he prepares for a world-renowned classical music competition, his violin is stolen. The mystery involves who might have taken it. There were many characters who had motives. Being black in the classical music world, Ray endured racial prejudice and had to overcome many obstacles. As a debut novel, the writing was a little simplistic and predictable. However,  I thought the story was enjoyable, and I liked Ray very much as a character. I think it is worth a read!

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The Only Woman in the Room

The Only Woman in the Room by Marie Benedict

Rating: 4

Historical Fiction

I began reading this book in July when we were in Colorado. I made it about 3/4 of the way through and stopped. Not because the book wasn't good, but because my life just seemed to get crazy. I read other books as this one sat on my table reminding me that I needed to finish it.

Don is an old movie buff, so he knew who Hedy Lamarr was, but I did not. In case you have never heard of her, she was a famous Hollywood actress between 1938 and 1949, with her greatest success as Delilah in Cecil B. DeMille's Samson and Delilah. 

Hedy was born Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler in 1914 in Vienna. In 1933, she married Friedrich Mandl, an Austrian military arms merchant and munitions manufacturer who had ties with Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler. Lamarr sat in on many dinner conversations in which she became aware of the plans leading up to World War II.

After escaping her marriage and fleeing to London, Hedy met Louis B. Mayer of MGM who was there scouting European talent. She traveled to the United States with him in 1937.

I don't want to tell the whole story, but it really is fascinating. She was not only a talented and beautiful actress, but she was also a scientist. One of her inventions led to something we all use today: WiFi.

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The Family

 

The Family by Naomi Krupitsky

Rating: 4

Suspense

I wasn't sure how to classify this book. Amazon says it is a thriller, but I don't read thrillers, and I wasn't scared while reading it. I would describe it as a mild version of The Godfather. Yes, I read The Godfather - in high school. That was a thriller. 

Two girls, Sofia and Antonia, are connected from the time they are born. They live next door to each other, and their bedroom walls are close enough that they can talk to each other through them. Their families are part of the Brooklyn mafia known as "The Family." The Family gets together every Sunday for dinner and the men discuss "business" that needs to take place that week.

Then one day, Antonia's father disappears and Sofia's father may have had something to do with it. The girls drift apart as they grow into young women, wives, and mothers. But their bond cannot be broken. When one of them is in dire need of help, the other will not let her down.

This book kept my attention! It's hard to believe things like this really happened. Maybe are still happening?

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The Dutch House

 

The Dutch House by Ann Patchett

Rating: 4

Literary Fiction

Ann Patchett's The Dutch House was a Pulitzer Prize Finalist in 2020. The writing is excellent, as you would expect. The story is mainly about the relationship between Danny and his older sister, Mauve, who grow up in a grand house in Pennsylvania. The description of the house reminded me of Stan Hywet. Their father, Cyril, purchased the house for his wife thinking she would love it. Not so. She hated the house because she felt out of place and wanted nothing more than to serve the poor. Her drive to help people led her to leave the family when Danny was still very young. Mauve, who was several years older, stepped in as a mother figure.

Soon after, a woman named Andrea, who is obsessed with the house, worms her way into Cyril's life and they marry. She has no love for Danny and Mauve. In fact, she throws them out of the house when their father dies. Fortunately, Danny and Mauve are grown by then. Up until their exile, they lived lives of plenty. Afterward, they are left to fend for themselves and this makes them rely on each other more than ever. 

The book is very character-driven. Not much plot. The brother/sister relationship between Danny and Mauve was the main point of the book for me. I enjoyed it. FYI - Tom Hanks reads the audio version.

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The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell

 

The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell by Robert Dugoni

Rating: 4

Coming of Age Fiction

I had never heard of a condition called ocular albinism, but that is what the protagonist of this book was born with. His eyes appeared red, and so his classmates at Our Lady of Mercy Catholic School teased him, beat him up, and left him to sit by himself on the bleachers during lunch and recess. He was called Sam Hell and Devil Boy by the boys and girls at school. 

Sam's mom always told him that it was God's plan for him to have red eyes and he would have an extraordinary life. Sam could not see that happening. Fortunately, Ernie Cantwell, the only African American child in his class became Sam's friend, or Sam would still be sitting on the bleachers. And another outcast, Michaela (Mickie) Kennedy, whose home life was such that she needed the support of another family - hung out at Sam's house quite a bit.

Sam does move on to become an ophthalmologist who does great things, and his friends Ernie and Mickie stay part of his life. The story moves back and forth between their childhood and their adulthood.

This book is a fast-moving and entertaining read, perfect for the beach or pool. It certainly won't win a literary prize, but if you like a story that follows a family over a long period of time, this one is for you.

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West With Giraffes

 

West with Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge

Rating: 4

Historical Fiction

Woody Nickel, a 103-year-old man in a nursing home, recalls a journey that he took from New York harbor to the San Diego Zoo in 1938.

Rutledge got the idea for this based-on-fact story while she was writing a book on the history of the San Diego Zoo. She came across a newspaper article about two giraffes that survived the 1938 hurricane and were then transported in very large crates across the country. 

Woody was 17 years old when he became an orphan as the effects of the Dust Bowl took his mother, father, and younger sister. He ended up working on the docks in New York harbor when he saw the two giraffes for the first time. Woody ends up helping "Old Man" deliver the two giraffes to San Diego. 

This is a heart-warming story of friendship, loss, love, and one near-disaster after another. I really enjoyed it! The photo above was taken in 1938 showing the giraffes in the large crates sitting on a small flat-bed truck that Woody drove.

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The Book of Lost Names

 

The Book of Lost Names by Kristin Harmel

Rating: 4.5

Historical Fiction

This novel was based on a true story that took place in France during World War II. Eva, the daughter of Polish Jews, flees Paris with her mother after her father is captured and taken to prison. They settle in a small town near the Swiss border where members of the community help people (mostly children) hide and eventually cross the border to safety.

Eva, who has artistic talent, becomes a forger of papers needed to change the identities of those seeking to flee. During her work with The Resistance, she falls in love, risks her life, and experiences many heartbreaking events. She insists on recording the true identities of the children whose names were changed so that after the war they might be reunited with their families.

This book was a page-turner.  My only two complaints are that too many things seemed tied up in a bow, and too many people told Eva, "It's not your fault." These two things did not stop me from enjoying this book very much. Highly recommend it if you liked The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah.

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A Place for Us

 

A Place for Us by Fatima Farheen Mirza

Rating: 5

Literary Fiction

I'm so sad that I waited this long to read A Place for Us. I was supposed to buddy read it with Katherine three years ago, and I dropped the ball.

Let's just start by saying that this is my kind of book: well-written, character-driven, family dynamics, fitting into the world, looking back on life...I could go on.

The book begins with the wedding of Rafiq and Layla's oldest child, Hadia. They are an Indian-American family living in California within a Muslim community. Their son, Amar, has been estranged for three years but returns for the wedding of his sister. From this scene, the author weaves a story back and forth in time and between characters to paint a picture of how they got to this point and beyond. I loved the way Mirza developed the characters, especially Hadia, Amar, and Rafiq. I felt like I was right there living with this family. They had challenges such as sibling rivalry, fitting into the American way of life, becoming individuals in a Muslim community, racism after 9/11, and parenting choices. 

The most amazing thing about this book is that it was written by a 27-year-old woman. I had no idea that she was so young until after I finished the book and was curious about the author. This debut book was incredible. I don't say this about many books, but I will probably read this one again someday.

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As Bright as Heaven

 

As Bright as Heaven by Susan Meissner

Rating: 4

Historical Fiction

In 1918, the Spanish Flu pandemic hit Philadelphia. The Bright family had just moved there to help aging Uncle Fred run his funeral home business. The flu was extremely contagious and took the lives of both young and old. You would think that this book was written after 2020, but it was actually published in 2018. 

Only a small part of the novel focuses on the pandemic and World War 1. Most of it follows the lives of the three Bright daughters (Evelyn, Maggie, and Willa) who come of age during these two events and the aftermath.

The historical parts of this book were very interesting since I haven't read that much on U. S. History in the early part of the 20th century. The history of the Spanish flu was also interesting in light of COVID-19. 

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