The Book That Matters Most by Ann Hood is a novel about Ava, a woman living in Providence, Rhode Island. Her husband of 25 years leaves her for an old fling, her grown kids are both living abroad and she finds herself alone and lonely, until she joins a book club. This book club is much more serious than any I have ever been a part of, it was intimidating just reading about it. Each person picks the book that…
The Dollhouse by Fiona Davis is historical fiction based on the Barbizon Hotel for women, referred to as The Dollhouse in the 50’s, and the women who lived there. Mystery unfolds as present day journalist Rose tries to discover what happened on a tragic night in 1952 to one of the older women still living in the building. Rich in detail of NYC’s jazz scene at the time, and full of colorful characters, this should have been a great book….
Swimming Lessons by Claire Fuller is a novel set in Dorset, England. A mystery involving the disappearance and assumed drowning of a mother with ten and fifteen year old daughters. During the last days before her disappearance, she wrote letters to her husband and placed them in the books piled all over the house. Eleven years later, believing he has spotted his missing wife, the father takes a bad fall and the daughters come home to take care of him….
The Revolving Door of Life by Alexander McCall Smith is part of his 44 Scotland Street Series. I’ve read a couple of these, so far this is my favorite. McCall Smith is back with his usual charm and wit; this time Bertie’s Mother is on a prolonged stay in the Persian Gulf. When his Grandmother arrives from Portugal, she quickly cancels his yoga, psycho-therapy and Italian lessons, orders him a pizza and gets down to the business of letting him…
The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper by Phaedra Patrick is a sweet book about a sixty-nine year old man whose wife of forty years has just died. On the one year anniversary of her death, he decides to clean out her closet and finds a gold charm bracelet unlike anything he has ever seen his wife wear. It sets him on a trail of discovery and travel as he finds the meaning behind each charm and uncovers his wife’s long…
When Women Were Birds, Fifty Four Meditations on Voice by Terry Tempest Williams is a beautiful, poetic, meditative memoir that is written in honor of Tempest William’s mother, who has passed away and left her her journals; three shelves of journals she was instructed not to read until her mother was gone. When she opened them, she found every single one blank. This book is Tempest William’s reflections on what that might mean, and we are richer for the experience…
The Girls is the debut novel by Emma Cline that’s gotten a lot of buzz so I was curious to read it. Beautifully written and heartbreaking all at the same time. Cline explores the interior life of lost teenage girls who get caught up in a CA cult at the end of the 60’s led by an enigmatic, yet creepy older guy; yet she fails to capture the essence of the times and how this place might have seemed a…
I was so excited to read The Lion in the Living Room by Abigail Tucker and I couldn’t have been more disappointed. This is non-fiction, with the sub-title How House Cats Tamed Us and Took Over the World. I wish I could invite Tucker to spend just a few hours with me and my cats to prove how wrong most of the information in this book is. If you’re truly a cat lover you will most likely disagree and dislike…
The Mountain Story by Lori Lansens is a novel about 4 broken people who get lost on a Mountain in Southern California for 5 days and not all of them make it out alive. Told years later by a Father to his son, it’s a harrowing tale of survival and bravery, family and friendship. I didn’t really enjoy the book as I kept waiting for the inevitable bad things to happen. However, it was well written, and if you like…
Lab Girl by Hope Jahren is a memoir by a brilliant scientist telling of her early days in her Dad’s lab in Minnesota, through her education and struggles to make it as a female botanist with a lab of her own. She shares the journey with her eccentric lab partner Bill and eventually a husband and son. She is now a tenured professor at the University of Hawaii. Part personal history, part a love story to science and plants, this…