Book Review: The River Wife

So, I had this novel listed by "J. Agee" on my TBR list. I assumed it was by James Agee and was distressed to see, upon finding it at the library, that the author of The River Wife is actually Jonis Agee. I nearly put the book back on the shelf but decided to take a chance. After all, I must have added it to my TBR list because of someone's great review.

The novel starts with a young wife, Hedie, who finds an old diary one night while waiting for her husband to come home. The story then shifts to Annie Ducharme and her river bandit husband, Jacques Ducharme. Eventually we get to Ducharme's second wife, and then, well, I got mixed up, honestly.

I really liked the story of Annie. And I liked the stories of Omah, Laura, and Maddie, although I'm not sure I could tell you what relation they were to Jacques, Annie, and each other. The story of Hedie was also interesting. The problem for me was that I couldn't quite piece together all of the connections these women and their stories had to Jacques. I kept feeling like something was missing, that all would be revealed just around the corner.

There was so much unsaid in the novel—so much reading-between-the-lines that needed to be done. I tried, I really did. Again, I really loved Annie Lark's story, and I wish the novel could have been just about her and Jacques. This first third of the novel was beautifully written, rich in character and language. In the end, though, I felt sort of unfulfilled and a little dumb. What did I miss? How did I miss it? Ever feel like that at the end of a novel? 

Book Review: The Rebel Wife

I had a hard time putting down this post-Civil War novel by Taylor Polites. I was even reading during breakfast and lunch, which is quite an unusual feat for this mom who usually saves reading for bedtime. The novel was that engrossing.

Augusta Branson is a new widow, thrown into a world of chaos and confusion just when she thought life might be returning to some semblance of normalcy after the Civil War. Born into a wealthy, well-respected Southern family, Augusta lost seemingly everything during the war: her father, brother, and her lifestyle. She is forced by her mother to marry a Eli, a man hated by her society for his political standings.

When Eli dies of a strange sickness, Augusta quickly realizes that she knows absolutely nothing about anything—that, as a rich southern woman, she has been kept in the dark her entire life. The Judge, who has been a father figure of sorts to her, informs her that she has no money—that her husband was scoundrel. But her husband's trusted servant, Simon, has a different story. Can she trust a former slave, whom she has believed to be vastly inferior, over her kin and mentor, the Judge?

 Augusta begins uncovering all kinds of truths she doesn't want to believe. She'd like to just exist in the oblivion that the doctor-prescribed laudanum brings—but can she really trust the doctor to know what's best for her? Are her servants hiding something? And most of all, how will she and her young son survive? 

Polites is an excellent writer, and this story of life in a violent time of upheaval after the war is mesmerizing. Highly recommended.

Book Review: Major Pettigrew's Last Stand

In this wonderfully warm debut novel, Helen Simonson introduces Ernest Pettigrew, a perfectly stuffy English gentleman. As the novel opens, Major Pettigrew has had a shock: his brother dies, and suddenly the Major, a widower, is terribly aware that he is alone in the world. His grown son is spoiled and selfish. Although he has always been proud of his own sense of duty, honor, tradition, and decorum, his life seems drab and predictable. And he can't seem to get Jasmina Ali, the Pakistani shopkeeper, out of his mind.

He finds himself going out of his way to see Mrs. Ali, who is a widow, first by sharing snippets of books and then sharing rides and walks. But as the villagers sense what is going on, they are shocked and talk quietly amongst themselves. The Major, one of their own, with a foreigner? And a shopkeeper at that?

For Major Pettigrew, being honorable is not a facade. He is appalled by the people that he considered his friends and neighbors, and his son's selfishness fills him with a mixture of despair and disgust. As various events and side stories unfold, the Major again and again chooses what is right, both for himself and for society.

This was a beautifully written, lovely novel. Simonson paints the Major and Mrs. Ali so clearly that I can perfectly imagine them. I highly recommend this witty and thought-provoking debut novel! This was our book club's November read, and everyone absolutely loved it.

Book Review: The Violets of March

I wish I knew whom to credit with suggesting this novel by Sarah Jio. I absolutely loved it! It isn't anything earth-shattering nor headed for classic lit status, but The Violets of March was beautifully written and mesmerizing.

In her 20s, Emily Wilson was a best-selling author with a husband formerly on the "most desirable bachelors" list. Now in her 30s, she is a one-hit wonder author who is about to sign divorce papers. She has no idea what to do to reclaim her life until she receives a postcard from her Aunt Bee, requesting that she come to Bainbridge Island in Washington. Emily hasn't been to the family's summer spot in years, but she is hit with memories of the idyllic times she spent on the island with her aunt.

Emily commits to spending a month on the island, and on her first night, she finds an old diary. She doesn't know who wrote it, but the story captivates her. In the evenings she reads the diary, but during the day she finds that the island people, including her own family, hold a trove of secrets. She also meets and old love and possibly finds a new one.

This is just a lovely little book with all the right ingredients: family secrets, a mystery, romance, and great writing. I added several Sarah Jio books to my TBR list after reading this!

Book Review: Imperfect Birds

Some books are so hard to read, not because they are poorly written or tedious but because the subject matter is just plain frightening. David Sheff's Beautiful Boy —a memoir of his son's meth addition—comes to mind. Anne Lamott's Imperfect Birds, though a novel rather than a memoir, had the same effect on me, that uneasy mix of "there but for the grace of God" and "what do I really know?" (And, to be honest in full realization that this is illogical thinking, "whew! I'm glad I am not raising kids in California!")

Elizabeth knows her 17-year-old daughter, Rosie, isn't perfect. Rosie has toyed with all kinds of typical teenage things: drugs, drinking, partying, sex. But Rosie's grades are fantastic and she always reassures Elizabeth that those were things she "tried once," but never again. Rosie convinces her parents that they are way off track whenever they express suspicions about her behavior. Elizabeth believes that she herself is way too suspicious and even borderline crazy. She tells herself that her own battle with alcohol and prescription meds makes her an ultra-vigilant, overprotective, suspicious parent.

Elizabeth doesn't trust her own instincts and continues to bury her fears, and Rosie's drug use continues to escalate. This isn't a shocking, "that could never happen to us" novel. Elizabeth and James are regular parents, trying to figure out the balance between being authoritative and permissive. Rosie is a master manipulator, and yet the reader always really likes her and is even lured into believing her—just as her parents do.

Lamott is a beautiful, insightful writer and a wonderful storyteller. If you have teenagers, this book will probably scare you and leave you wondering what kind of secret life your own teens have. Highly recommended.

Book Review: The Lost Saints of Tennessee

This was one of those books I pulled off the "to be shelved" shelves in the library—the first place I always check at the library. Living in Tennessee, I was attracted by the title. Books about Southerners can go either way: they can be unbelievably beautiful, or unbelievably stereotypical and tacky.

The Lost Saints of Tennessee definitely is not on the tacky end of the scale. Author Amy Franklin-Willis knows tiny towns in Tennessee, but rather than make her characters fat, dumb, and full of snappy comebacks—which happens all too often in books about the south (as opposed to Southern Lit), she made them real.

Zeke Cooper is a sad middle-aged man who had never recovered from his twin brother's death. His ex-wife recently remarried, his daughters are drifting away from him, he is utterly estranged from his mother, and he feels like an utter failure. He just can't figure out why he should go on living. But his suicide attempt is thwarted, and he tries a different angle.

After his failed suicide, Zeke drives from Tennessee to his cousin's house in Virginia, where he spent a happy semester while he was in college. It is there that Zeke finds healing, reconciliation, and redemption.

Much of the story takes place in flashbacks to Zeke's high school years, through both his mother's eyes and through Zeke's point of view. I loved the whole story of Zeke and his brother Carter and how different the stories are from the two points of view.

This is the author's first novel, and I look forward to what she has next.

Book Review: Blue Diary

Why haven't I read more Alice Hoffman? She's a prolific writer, and I have loved everything I have read so far, but somehow she just isn't on my radar. I need to change that.

Recently a friend said that I must read Hoffman's The Dovekeepers. It was checked out at the library, so I pulled  Blue Diary off the shelf instead. And wow! Alice Hoffman can tell a story. First off, this is a slightly gory and pretty disturbing book; but if you can handle a grisly murder and the frightening possibility that we aren't who we say we are, you should read it.

Ethan Ford is the town's sweetheart. Everyone loves him. He rescues kids from burning houses, coaches Little League like no one else, is incredibly handsome, and is madly in love with his wife and son. And then his face shows up on America's Most Wanted one evening, and everything changes instantly. Who is Ethan Ford? And did he really do it?

The novel mainly focuses on Jori and Collie, his wife and son, as they try to figure out the truth—and if there can possibly be two truths. Or one Ethan. Or  no Ethan. And can you—must you—keep loving someone who may or may not exist?

Highly recommended but definitely a bit grisly.

Book Review: The Healing

My friend Julie, who ranks high on the coolness factor, said I must read this book ASAP. Amazingly, I had "go to library" on my to-do list for that day, went to the library, and actually found the book on the shelf! It was a very good library day.

Jonathan O'Dell's The Healing is a can't-put-it-down kind of book. The story flashes between old Granny Satterfield and an orphan girl she inherits, and Granny's life as a slave, first as a pet to the grief-stricken, crazed landowner's wife and then as the plantation's reluctant healer.


Old Granny tells the traumatized orphan girl the story of her life in bits and pieces, hoping to bring healing to her through words and connections. Old Granny was torn from her mother's arms as a newborn at the demand of her mistress, whose own daughter had just died. Mistress dresses the girl, whom she names Granada, in her dead daughter's outfits and keeps her by her side. She doesn't love Granada but needs her as some sort of comfort item or plaything. The mistress also insists on keeping a monkey as a pet, and she becomes a laughingstock of the community, with her slave girl dressed in frills and her pet monkey climbing on her shoulders.

The young Granada, however, is convinced that the mistress sees her as a daughter. She is bewildered and horrified when she is yanked from her comfortable life in the big house to become the new healer's apprentice. The master purchases Polly Shine to cure his slaves of a terrible disease, and Polly immediately sees a kindred spirit in Granada. She insist on having her as a helper, and Granada's life becomes a nightmare. She does learn from Polly, in spite of herself, but her obstinate nature causes more than one disaster.

As Granny narrates her stories to the orphan girl, she finds healing in herself and release from the burden of the poor choices she made during her days as Polly Shine's apprentice.

If you liked such novels as The Help and The Kitchen House, you'll love The Healing! Highly recommended.

Book Review: Saving Ruth

Saving Ruth by Zoe Fishman (not to be confused with Drowning Ruth by Christina Schwartz) was a fun coming-of-age novel about a girl who has finished her freshman year in college and returns home for the summer.

Do you remember that feeling? I do. You've been away from home for 9 months, and when you come back, everything has changed. Your world has slipped. You are caught between becoming someone new, and readjusting to who you were.

It occurred to me after reading the novel that I had somewhat of an opposite life as Ruth Wasserman. She is a dark-haired Jewish girl raised in the midst of blond Baptists in the south; I was a blond Protestant raised among scores of dark-haired Italian Catholics in the north. She headed north for college; I headed south. She was a slightly overweight girl who became a skinny girl at college; I was a skinny girl who put on the freshman 10 in college. But those are just accessories to the real story, that of 19-year-old who is finding her place in the world, and being constantly shocked by the revelations that unfold as she goes along.

I liked the novel. It took me back to that place and time quite easily—Fishman does a great job of capturing the thoughts of a 19-year-old. The rest of the characters were rather flat, but this was really all about Ruth, anyway.

I also enjoyed this novel as the parent of two teens because it reminded me about how much our words can affect our kids. In Ruth's eyes, her mom was "always" commenting on her daughter's weight. In her mom's eyes, she made a few comments here and there. This made me think about what I say to my kids regarding their shyness, for example. I don't ever want to make them feel like I don't love them exactly how they are. It's a tricky balance, and so often in comes down to perception.

The book could have had a lot more depth had Fishman revealed other stories that she barely touched upon: the troubled marriage of Ruth's parents, her brother's struggle as an artist, the issue of growing up Jewish in the south. As it is, it's a nice beach read that will take you back to your own coming-of-age days.

*FTC Full Disclosure - The publisher sent me a copy of the book, in hopes I would review it.

Book Review: In the Bag

I love being surprised by a book. When I read the premise of Kate Klise's In the Bag, I thought it would probably be trite and maybe silly: " A European vacation. A luggage mix-up. A note from a secret admirer." But Kate Klise's debut adult novel (she writes children's mystery books) is anything but trite and silly. I loved it.

Single dad Andrew and his son Webb and single mom Daisy and her daughter Coco are all traveling to Europe, and the teenagers get their bags mixed up. That's the part that sounds silly, right? But oh-my-goodness. Klise has an incredible knack for dialog, whether it's the characters speaking or sending emails.

The teens find contact info in the bags and begin emailing each other in an attempt to exchange bags. (One is in Madrid, the other in Paris.) They hit it off immediately via email.What they don't know is that Andrew, Webb's dad, spied the pretty Daisy on the airplane and, in an out-of-character gesture, dropped a flirty note in her bag. Back in her hotel room, when she finds the note, she is appalled and shoots off an angry email to him.

Predictably, the teens find a way to meet, and ultimately their parents meets, and they all end up together. I am sure I'm not spoiling anything by revealing this. But what happens in the middle is so worth reading. How does written communication (email) stack up to meeting in real life? I find this especially interesting because I am so much better at communicating in writing that in speaking in person.

Klise knows teens. She knows how they think and talk and panic. But she also knows adults, and she has created four incredibly real characters in this novel. The novel alternates among the viewpoints of the two teens and their parents, so we get a tour inside all of their heads. There are all kinds of missed cues and misunderstandings that are so familiar in that we've all been there (even if not in Paris or Madrid), and Klise does it all so well.

What a fun novel—well written, witty, and insightful. No, it's not Pulitzer Prize winning, but who cares. Get it, read it, and pass it on!


*FTC Full Disclosure - The publisher sent me a copy of the book, in hopes I would review it.

Book Review: The Forgotten Garden

Oh, Kate Morton, how I love you!
The House at Riverton was wonderful.
The Distant Hours was simply delicious.

But The Forgotten Garden? It was just, well, it was everything I could possibly want in a novel. A mystery with a ghost story feel. Romance, lost love, found love, familial love, orphans, good guys, villains, a manor, a secret garden (and speaking of that, well-done cameos with real life figures), fairy tales, and did I mention suspense?

Well, and then, of course, Kate Morton is a writer of astounding grace and perspicacity. I mean, I know that no one is perfect and all that, but quite possibly, Kate Morton is a perfect writer. Really.

OK, so here is the story in a nutshell: a little girl is lost on a big ship while waiting for the Authoress to come back to get her. But the Authoress never does, and when the ship lands in Australia, the little girl, assumed to be an orphan, is adopted by the dockmaster and his wife. When she is grown, the dockmaster tells Nell the truth—or as much as he knows of it. Chapter by chapter, the truth is gradually uncovered, sometimes by Nell and sometimes by her granddaughter, Cassandra. Who is the Authoress? Who is Nell? Why was she left alone on a ship bound for Australia?

The cast of characters reaches far back into the life of the Authoress. You'll meet a man in a black suit, a Dickensian harridan, an obsessive uncle, a kindly old fisherman, a beautiful invalid, a wicked aunt, and, of course, a garden maze that follows many twists and turns and dead ends. 

Please read this book. And please, Kate Morton, MORE!

Book Review: You Don't Sweat Much for a Fat Girl

Sigh. Yes, I read a book titled You Don't Sweat Much for a Fat Girl. Not only did I read it, but I picked it for book club! Just to clarify, I submitted a long list of what I thought were excellent choices, and I stuck this one at the end of the list. The other books were all intense (Room, for example), and I thought this one might bring some levity. So all the other books were rejected ("too depressing"), and this one made the cut.

I loved Celia Rivenbark's Stop Dressing Your Six Your Old Like a Skank and We're Just Like You Only Prettier. I laughed and laughed and laughed! But this book? This one was actually horrible. I apologized profusely to my book club for having it on my list. There was absolutely nothing funny about it. It was embarrassing, actually.

The problem? Rivenbark tries much, much too hard in this "humor" book, to be funny. In her other books, I thought I would like her as a person. In this book, I knew for sure I would run the other way. She is waaaayy too snarky. She swears way too much. She sounds like a 10-year-old just finding out that some words are "naughty." It's embarrassing. I mean, I was embarrassed for her as an author. I just wanted to call her and say, "Please stop."

I think only one person besides me finished the book for book club. A few people read some and called it quits. As one member said midway through, "When is this going to get funny?" It doesn't.

And so that is all the time I am devoting to Rivenbark. I'm not even going to take the time to put a picture of the book in my post. I will probably never read another one of her books. The end.

Book Review: More Like Her

I absolutely loved Liza Palmer's Conversations with a Fat Girl, so I was excited to get a chance to review More Like Her. First off, I have to say that the blurb on the back of the book threw me off. It didn't really reflect the essence of the novel, making it sound more about "what goes on behind white picket fences" and less about the main character, Franny.

The novel really is about Frances and her journey to self-discovery. The character Emma, who is murdered by her crazy husband, is lightly drawn, as are Franny's two friends, Lisa and Jill. And that's absolutely fine, because Frances is a fantastic character. As I recall from her Conversations, Palmer has an uncanny ability to capture the thoughts and insecurities we probably all have at times. How do I measure up? Why can't I be more like so-and-so? Am I flawed and abnormal? Why is this all so easy for everyone else?

Franny has spent a lifetime putting up walls, and as events unfold, she understands that she has to start allowing her real self to be shown. But as she says, "Freedom, with all its possibilities, just feels cold and lonely. I want to go back to my tower. I need those walls. I need the protection."

You know how it is when you discover something about yourself that is obvious to others but not to you. You kind of want to shove it back down, but you know you need to look it in the face. So often our self-perception is just warped, sometimes we just have quirks that need tweaked. This novel is really about self-revelation—and choices. Knowing what to keep and what to discard, what to refine and what to tear down.

Liza Palmer is chick lit without the fluff and feathers. She knows real people. Her characters are people we know—are us— and they talk like real people, too. If you haven't read her, check her out!

Book Review: The Distant Hours

Kate Morton is waaaaay up there on my list of favorite contemporary authors. I loved The House at Riverton, and I think I love The Distant Hours even more.

The novel begins with a lost bag of mail and a letter delivered to Edie's mother 40 years too late. Edie is fascinated to learn that her stodgy mother once lived in a castle with a famous author and his three daughters. From here the novel journeys to Milderhurst Castle, past and present, and into the lives of the three spinster sisters: Juniper, Percy, and Saffy. Edie and her mother are also wrapped up in the story, as are a cast of other characters who skirt on the edges of their lives.

The Distant Hours is a gothic novel full of mystery, suspense, romance, and hauntings. It isn't a ghost story, but it feels like one in a heart-palpitating, edge-of-your-seat kind of way. Morton is a superb writer and mesmerizing storyteller. Her prose is lyrical and her characters so well-drawn that I can still see them clearly, weeks after finishing the book. This is one of those books that I thought about during the day and couldn't wait to get to in the evenings. I read the last part slowly, reluctant to come to the end and leave the fascinating Blythe sisters.

Morton manages to let the castle keep some secrets and yet tie up the stories in a satisfying way, and I love that. Although the story is terribly sad in many ways, she manages to wrap it all up in an optimistic fashion. She does a masterful job balancing the haunting quality of the book with the practicality of modern day Edie, who is a young woman scorned in love.

I highly recommend this novel! Fortunately, I still have one more Morton novel, The Forgotten Garden, to enjoy.

Book Review: Brooklyn

I’ve had this book by Colm Toibin on my TBR list for a few years, but it really jumped out at me as I was searching the library shelves for books to take with me on our trip to NYC. The timing was perfect. I read this immigrant’s story while staying in Chelsea, just a couple blocks away from the subway stop where the main character disembarks, leading to one memorable scene.

Eilis is the youngest sibling in an Irish family, and her sister and brothers come up with the funds to send her to Brooklyn, hoping that she will be able to have a better life there. Eilis seems powerless to refuse and is swept along with their plans, although she really has no desire to relocate to America. She is a girl who hasn’t yet found herself, having always been under the shadow of her vivacious, beautiful and compassionate sister, Rose.

Once in Brooklyn, Eilis becomes more solid. She has a sharp mind for bookkeeping and begins taking classes at Brooklyn College while working full time. She handles her new life with careful study and composure, figuring out the best way to navigate this surprising new world.

She balances waves of homesickness with determination to succeed in America. Eventually she meets Tony, an Italian, and comes to the proverbial fork in the road.

That’s the story in a nutshell, but Toibin is a graceful, unhurried storyteller. He takes time to consider the small details in Eilis’s life and those of other characters without necessarily drawing everything into the main story. So much that happens serves to round out Eilis’s character, and we are part of her growing process.  There are small “a-ha” moments, times when Eilis reflects on the way the world works and how she fits into it.

Brooklyn is a coming-of-age story, a romance, a slice of life, an immigrant’s story, all rolled into a tightly written but luxurious novel.

Linked up with Semicolon's Saturday Review of Books

Book Review: The Escape Artist

For some people it's Nicholas Sparks or Jodi Picoult, but Diane Chamberlain is my guilty pleasure. Her books are full of coincidences and crazy events, but somehow I just love them. The Escape Artist is my third Chamberlain novel. I loved The Midwife's Confession and The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes (see, even the titles are telltale cheese), and I liked this one just as well. They're just good, satisfying tales of improbable events.

The Escape Artist tells the tale of Susanna Miller, who takes her baby and runs when she loses custody of him to her ex-husband and his new wife. She travels across the country to reinvent herself. Of course she is always terrified that she'll be caught, but she also misses her boyfriend. She eventually meets another guy and tries to start a new life, but of course the story can't be as simple as that.

I can't help it. I'm occasionally a sucker for total drama, and somehow Diane Chamberlain sucks me in every time. Seriously, if you need books that you can't put down, are full of a range of coincidences that you somehow don't even roll your eyes at, and have these fantastic characters, get a stack of Chamberlain's novels. You might feel a little sheepish, but it'll be worth it.

Book Review: The Things They Carried

"Forty-three years old, and the war occurred half a lifetime ago, and yet the remembering makes it now. And sometimes remembering will lead to a story, which makes it forever. That's what stories are for. Stories are for joining the past to the future. Stories are for those late hours in the night when you can't remember how you got from where you were to where you are now. Stories are for eternity, when memory is erased, with there is nothing to remember except the story."

When I was in college, I took an intense class on the Vietnam War. It was taught by a history professor and a psychology professor, who served two tours in Vietnam. I loved this class with every fiber of my being. I cannot even begin to list all the books we read and all the ones I read later about Vietnam.

"They carried USO stationery and pencils and pens. The carried Sterno, safety pins, trip flares, signal flares, spools of wire, razor blades, chewing tobacco, liberated joss sticks and statuettes of the smiling Buddha, candles, grease pencils, The Stars and Stripes, fingernail clippers, Psy Ops leaflets, bush hats, bolos and much more."

But that was all before Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried. It was published just a few years after I graduated from college, but somehow I just wasn't ready to read any more Vietnam War novels for a long time after being immersed in that class. And now my oldest is in college and had to read something by Tim O'Brien for a class. He loved it and picked up a bunch of O'Brien's books at a used book store, including The Things They Carried, which he then declared about the best book he has ever read. (And, like his parents, he is a prolific reader, and, like his mother, an English major.)

"They carried the sky. The whole atmosphere, they carried it, the humidity, the monsoons, the stink of fungus and decay, all of it, they carried gravity."

And so I finally read it. I was hooked from the very first line, and I was reluctant to put it down each night to sleep. I carried it with me during the day when I wasn't reading it. I carried the language of Tim O'Brien—the absolutely beautiful poetry, the lyrical longing, the heartbreak.

"They carried the land itself—Vietnam, the place, the soil—a powdery orange-red dust that covered their boots and fatigues and faces."

The Things They Carried is a novel—a work of fiction. It's also a memoir—a work of creative nonfiction. And it is for sure a work of poetry. Blended together, the line between truth and fiction (what really happened to Tim O'Brien, the author, and Tim, the soldier) is blurry. The stories he tells may or may not have happened exactly like he tells them, at least to him. But in the collective face of war, they are true to the core.

What words can I use to describe the book? Haunting. Terrifying. Heartbreaking. Beautiful. Brilliant. It's a war story, a love story, a study of lives stopped and started again but never the same. Please, please read it.

"And in the end, of course, a true war story is never about war. It's about sunlight. It's about the special way that dawn spreads out on a river when you know you must cross the river and march into the mountains and do things you are afraid to do. It's about love and memory. It's about sorrow. It's about sisters who never write back and people who never listen."

Book Review: A Secret Kept

I had such high hopes for this newest novel by Tatiana de Rosnay, author of Sarah's Key, which I absolutely loved. (My review here.) And while A Secret Kept wasn't nearly up to par with Sarah's Key, I did enjoy it.

The story focuses on Antoine and Melanie, brother and sister in their 40s, who take a birthday vacation to the sea at Noirmoutier Island. As children they spent many happy summers there on the beach with their family before their mother died. They spend the weekend reminiscing, wishing that they'd had more years with their mother, who died so young. On the way back to Paris, Melanie tells Antoine that she remembered something disturbing about their mother. Before she can disclose the secret, they are in a car accident and Melanie is seriously injured.

So. We wait for the secret to be revealed for many, many chapters as Antoine's life back in Paris falls apart. His wife has left him for another man, his children are hellions, and he hates his job. Melanie gradually heals and finally tells him the secret.

I'm not going to tell you the secret. It's not what I expected, and it was kind of a let-down, frankly. It seemed kind of contrived and trite. Perhaps I am a jaded reader who wants a fresher secret.

So, I really liked the book for a long time, but after the secret was revealed I kind of felt a bit manipulated. I don't know why. But I did still really enjoy Antoine's story, which turned out to be happy. Now of course you must read it, as you'll want to know the secret. Go ahead! de Rosnay is a great writer.

Book Review: The Sex Lives of Cannibals

This travelogue/memoir by Maarten Troost is neither about sex nor cannibals, particularly, although both make an appearance on the island of Tarawa, where Troost and his partner, Sylvia, spend two years. Bored of life in America and anxious to make a difference in the world and have an adventure in the process. Sylvia and Maarten head off to this remote, romantic island paradise in the South Pacific.

Paradise, it is not. Romantic, rarely. But remote, absolutely. The beaches (AKA toilets) are polluted with an accumulation of historical trash and fresh trash. Diseases are rampant. Food is scarce. Electricity is sporadic. The natives find Sylvia and Maarten endlessly interesting. Mangy dogs—the cannibals—congregate in their back yard. Maarten has a love/hate relationship with Tarawa, but in the end he can see himself settling there forever--if he doesn't hurry up and leave.

This was our February book club pick and got very mixed reviews at our meeting. Four of us actually finished and thoroughly enjoyed the book. Two gave it up around Chapter 11, as the topic just did not appeal to them at all. The other four members just didn't have time to finish reading it, and two out of the four said they would for sure finish reading it, even though our meeting was over. So in all, over half our members really liked the book.

I think Maarten is an excellent writer and very, very funny. Astute, too, but without a biting sarcasm that so often weighs down travelogues in one way or another. I liked Maarten enough that I'd read his next book, Getting Stoned with Savages.

Book Review: An Atlas of Impossible Longing

For awhile, I was longing for the end of An Atlas of Impossible Longing by Anuradha Roy. Please understand: I began reading it in the car on my way to my uncle's funeral. I read it in bits and pieces in the hotel room and on the way back to Tennessee. I fell asleep, exhausted from the trip, after only reading a page or two each night. And then, midway through, I realized that I needed to re-read the novel I was teaching for British Literature (A Christmas Carol) and quickly read Emma Donoghue's Room, which was due at the library.

So the first half went kind of slow. It probably has much more to do with my state of mind and circumstances than with the book itself. But it took me a long, long time to get into the book. I thought the author's approach was difficult to navigate. I couldn't figure out what was going on and where it was happening. There were lots of characters. Just when I figured out who was who, the next section started. By the final section, I had all the characters figured out, and most of them had died or moved on anyway.

The novel starts in India with the patriarch of the family, who chooses country life to that of the big city, and ends with the story of his granddaughter and the orphan boy with whom she was raised. I loved their stories; the preceding ones, not so much. Roy is a wonderful writer. Her images are full and palpable. The smells and sights of India are beautifully captured. I just couldn't quite connect with the characters in the first two sections. Things happened very slowly and then too quickly. But the third section felt just right.

Other novels set in India —or India and America— that I've reviewed here are:
Climbing the Stairs by Padma Venkatraman
Nectar in a Sieve by Kamala Markandaya
Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese
The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri
The Secret Daughter by Shilpi Somaya Gowda

Of the six, Cutting for Stone is my absolute favorite, followed by The Secret Daughter and Unaccustomed Earth (although this collection of stories centers on the struggles of Bengali immigrants and their children in America).