Homegoing

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Book Reviews, fiction, Homegoing, recommended reads, Yaa Gyasi

I am finding it difficult to write a review of Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi that will do it justice. This book is unlike anything I have read before and I imagine (or at least hope) that it will become required reading.

Gyasi takes us on a journey of centuries, from the Cape Coast of Africa to the coal mines of Alabama to the streets of Harlem all the while telling a captivating story of the power of history and the truth of slavery and its continued impacts. Each chapter tells the story of a different person and they interconnect back to two half-sisters separated early on, their lives and the lives of their ancestors ebbing and flowing across Africa and America.

Gyasi’s writing is precise, her imagery poignant and the themes of fire and water coming up again and again in the characters lives. From the NYT book review “At its best, the novel makes us experience the horrors of slavery on an intimate, personal level; by its conclusion, the characters’ tales of loss and resilience have acquired an inexorable and cumulative emotional weight.”

Other reviews have criticized Gyasi’s ability to adeptly handle the content and characters and mention her young age (26). However, I was fully immersed in this story and if this is where she starts,  I can only imagine what stories she has in store for us and I look forward to reading whatever she publishes next.

 

 

The Hearts of Men

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Book Reviews, fiction, Nickolas Butler, The Hearts of Men

I added The Hearts of Men by Nickolas Butler to my reading pile after a tweet about it from a book blogger whose taste often mirrors my own. In that tweet, @seetanyaread said “The Hearts of Men by Nikolas Butler is slaying me. I started it last night and will finish tonight. One of my favs this year.” She later followed up with “OK, so now Nikolas Butler has me crying. Reading Hearts of Men.” Who could ignore that kind of review, right?

I am glad I followed her advice as The Hearts of Men is a compelling novel. Butler weaves the story of several generations of boys through a common link to a boy scout camp, Camp Chippewa in Wisconsin. Butler starts with Nelson Doughty who is an eager and socially awkward teenager embarking on his annual week in the summer of 1962. Nelson is an ambitious scout who is proud to play the bugle each morning at reveille, which only leads to make him more of a target for his peers. Nelson’s father is chaperoning, but seems oblivious to his son or the fact that he is being bullied, focused instead on his own dissatisfaction with life. Nelson feels that he has found one ally in Jonathan Quick, but even Jonathan leverages Nelson’s awkwardness and desperation for friendship in a dramatic scene.

The second section is set in 1996 with Jonathan now a father with his own teenage son embarking on his week at Boy Scout camp, now managed by Nelson Doughty. We learn how Nelson ended up at  Camp Chippewa after the disappearance of his father, military school and a torturous tour in Vietnam. Meanwhile, Jonathan is engaged in an affair and arranges to introduce his son, Trevor, to his mistress at a dinner Nelson is also attending. Jonathan rides Trevor about Trevor’s high school love, Rachel, and sets out to prove that it will not last. The awkwardness is palpable and your heart burns for Trevor, but in the end, he is a teenage boy who is driven by things other than his heart at times.

The third and final section is set in 2019 and feels very similar to modern day. We are now met by Trevor’s son, Thomas, and his wife Rachel. They too are headed to Camp Chippewa, where an aging Nelson still runs the show. Thomas is less than enthusiastic about leaving his friends and easy access to WiFi to attend boy scout camp which feels old-fashioned and outdated. Rachel, one of the few mothers who has attended over the years, is eager to spend the time in the wilds of camp and connect her son to a part of his father never got to know. Once at the camp, the misogyny of the fathers is quickly apparent and leads to a horrifying encounter.

There were times throughout the novel where the scouting details became a little rote, however, the descriptions of the landscape are wonderfully vivid (the albino deer section was positively poetic). In the end, this was a novel about what drives men to be good and the things that can turn other men toward a more nefarious path.

 

 

The Sunshine Sisters

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Book Reviews, fiction, Jane Green, Sunshine Sisters

Thanks to Net Galley, I was able to read an advanced copy of this novel which will be published in June.

Jane Green is an author I have been reading for many years. Her stories are lighthearted chick lit and The Sunshine Sisters follows the vein of chick-lit, but her subject matter has gotten a little heavier. Luckily, everything works out in the end – as one would expect in a Jane Green novel.

The Sunshine sisters – Nell, Meredith and Lizzy – grew up with an actress mother, Ronni Sunshine, who was self-centered, materialistic and who could be cruel, especially to her daughters. After their difficult childhoods, they each move away from their mother and their sisters. Suddenly, they are all summoned back to their mother’s home and shockingly, they all go.

While there, they learn that their mother is dying and that she wants to connect the three of them in her last days before an assisted suicide. The sisters all go through grief and anger, but also seem to grow and reflect on the mistakes they have each made in their relationships and lives.

Nell was a young mother who has never opened herself up to romance and works hard to maintain the farm she worked at and eventually inherited.

Meredith is an accountant in London who has buried her artistic talents and is engaged to the dull and controlling Derek.

Lizzy a successful entrepreneur who is married to James and has a young son, but who has also been having an affair with her business partner.

By the time the novel ends and Ronni Sunshine decides to end her life on her terms, the sisters have re-bonded and face their uncertain futures together.

 

Difficult Women

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Book Reviews, Difficult Women, Roxane Gay, Short stories

My introduction to Roxane Gay was through her novel Untamed State which my book club read and which has stayed with me since I read it. I then read her essays in Bad Feminist and began to follow her on Twitter. I saw her speak at the Free Library of Philadelphia last month when I had started, but not finished her latest offering, a collection of short stories titled Difficult Women. Given that I’ve read a lot of what she has published, I think it’s safe to say I’m a fan.

The stories in Difficult Women run the gamut, from humorous to thought-provoking to unsettling. The thread that ties them together is the grit and “I don’t give any fucks” attitudes of at least one woman in each story. Some of the stories verged on the edge of disturbing, but that lead to me to question why and included a little examination into my own ideas, experiences and beliefs. As always, Gay pushes us to think outside the box of our limited, first-person experiences.

Her last two stories are probably the strongest. In Noble Things, the penultimate story, she imagines an America divided (again) into North and South by a fence with Florida, Texas and parts of the Midwest seceded from the Union. Given today’s political environment, that feels closer than ever to reality.

In Strange Gods she explores the story of a young woman who has been hurt by men from a young age and the impact that has on her ability to trust and expect from a partner. It is raw and like Untamed State, I think will be the story that stays with me the longest.

Like she is on Twitter, I don’t think her stories are for everyone, but if you are looking for thoughtful, provoking stories, look no further.

 

The Light of Paris

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Book Reviews, Eleanor Brown, The Light of Paris, women's fiction

It is no secret that Paris is one of my favorite places in the world. I dreamed of going to the city of lights from the time I was 12 until I was able to go in 2001 and I have returned two more times since then. Needless to say, books set in Paris are always of interest to me.

I picked up Eleanor Brown’s The Light of Paris with curiosity and joy and when I put it down I felt fulfilled and satisfied. The novel alternates between Madeleine in 1999 and her grandmother, Margie, in 1924. There are similarities in both women. They are stuck in archaic and bourgeois notions of what a woman’s role should be and feel suffocated by their reality and dream of escape. Both do not fit the mold of the women they are told they should aspire to be (thin, perfectly coifed, elegantly dressed, with no thoughts other than being good wives) and are instead awkward artistic women – Madeleine a painter and Margie a writer.  Margie gets the opportunity to escort a wily cousin to Europe in 1924, but when the plan goes awry she chooses to stay in Paris against her parent’s consent and wishes. Margie finds a job and falls in love with the city and a painter and I fell in love with Paris all over again with her.

Reading through her grandmother’s notebooks, Madeleine becomes inspired by her story and decides that it isn’t worth crushing herself into the mold of the luncheon ladies and begins to imagine and create a different future for herself.

Given that yesterday I was at the Women’s March in Philadelphia, finishing the story felt particularly poignant. It reminded me of how far women have come and yet the continued need to be able to create our own stories and follow our own dreams.

The Light of Paris isn’t a terribly heavy book, but it was an enjoyable and quick read. A final note – if you enjoyed The Help, you will enjoy The Light of Paris.

 

Commonwealth

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Ann Patchett, Book Reviews, Commonwealth, fiction, recommended reads

We all have authors that we love and when they publish a book there is a great excitement to see what they have to offer. But then we might read some reviews and some of those reviews might claim that the latest offering is not as good as the proceeding novels, leading us to put off reading it and worrying that the reviews will be right. Ann Patchett is one of those authors for me and yet, I found Commonwealth to be a well-written novel with well-developed characters and a plot that kept me reading late into the night.

No, it wasn’t as shocking and dramatic as Bel Canto, but Patchett is not the same writer she was when she wrote Bel Canto nor am I the same reader. But Commonwealth is just as good, if not a better, a novel than her more recent offerings. (Looking back at my past reviews of her work, I note that I compare all Patchett’s books to Bel Cant0)

What I liked about Commonwealth was the exploration of family relationships complicated by divorce and remarriage and the experiences that bind those relationships that are both intimate and distant often influenced on changing external factors.
Commonwealth centers on the Cousins and Keating children. Four Cousins (two boys and two girls) and two Keating children (two girls) are thrown together for most of their childhood summers after Mr. Cousins and the formerly Mrs. Keating marry and move to Virginia from LA. Time jumps from their childhood summers into their twenties and forties, as we track the six children along with their four parents. They deal with romantic relationships, illnesses and deaths, births and the rest of life’s moments both large and mundane in the shadow of what happened one particular summer. What is most interesting is tracking the relationships that are maintained and how the assumptions of the past fade and change.

I think readers who enjoy interesting, almost human characters and a compelling story would enjoy Commonwealth, especially if they leave any expectations at the door and just enjoy this well-written novel.

 

 

 

Valley of the Moon

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Book Reviews, fiction, Valley of the Moon

I picked up Valley of the Moon by Melanie Gideon somewhat reluctantly. It was recommended by a friend whose reading taste differs from mine, but who knows good writing, and the premise – a woman caught between two time periods – seemed a little far-fetched for me. But it’s summer reading season still and I figured what did I have to lose.

I’m glad I took the chance. It was a compelling and interesting read and I have to admit, I’ve been thinking about it days after I finished reading it.

Lux Lysander is a single-mom in San Francisco in 1975, who reluctantly ships her 5 year old son, Benno, off for a visit with her mother in Newport, RI. With two weeks free, Lux heads to the Sonoma Valley for some camping. It is there that she awakes in the middle of the night of a full moon into a thick fog which she follows into Greengage Farm which has been stuck in 1906 after the earthquake that devastated San Francisco.

There Lux meets and falls in love with the lifestyle of Joseph, his wife Martha, his sister Fancy and the other 100 or so residents of Greengage who had set up a self-sustaining farm in the early 1900s. They have recognized that they have been trapped by the fog since the earthquake, but until Lux arrives they don’t understand that the world and time has moved forth while they have not.

Thus begins a journey for Lux and Greengage, with her returning at every full moon when the fog appears. There are tense times when the fog doesn’t return for many months and others when she barely makes it back to her present time. I felt anxious as I read Valley of the Moon, I think because I knew this couldn’t end well. At some point, Lux and Greengage or Lux and her “real world” would be separated indefinitely. Would she leave Greengage behind forever or her son and real life in the 1970s?

I don’t want to give anyway any spoilers, but in the end there is a loss of time and experience and Lux pays the price for her and Benno’s choices, but in the end she almost gets the best of both worlds.

If you are looking for a quick and interesting read, I highly recommend Valley of the Moon.

A Well-Tempered Heart

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A Well-Tempered Heart, Book Reviews, Recommended fiction

I was at our local independent bookstore recently, Inkwood Books NJ, and saw that there was a sequel to the wonderful book, The Art of Hearing Heartbeats which I thoroughly enjoyed last year.

So it was with great interest that I picked up A Well-Tempered Heart to read the book jacket. The plot seemed interesting and I knew the writing would be good, so I had already decided to buy it.  Then the bookstore owner told me that the sequel was just as good as the original, which made me more excited.

A Well-Tempered Heart picks up with Julia 10 years after her last visit to Burma where she learned about her father’s past and met her half-brother U Ba in The Art of Hearing Heartbeats. Julia is back in New York, dealing with a failed relationship and knee-deep in her work as a lawyer. Sitting in a meeting she hears a voice and thus begins her journey to understand what is going on and a visit back to Burma to get to the bottom of what the voice wants from Julia.

Sendker weaves the stories of Julia, U Ba, Nu Nu and her two sons, Ko Gyi and Thar Thar, effortlessly and beautifully in this novel. Julia’s western biases, particularly about medication, are explored and she begins to appreciate the beauty of the rituals of the Burmese people especially the power of portents. I was pulled along and read the book quickly as I wanted to know what would happen with Julia and if the voice would return.

At the end, I was somewhat disappointed in how Sendker leaves the main characters (trying not to include any spoilers), but I guess it leaves it open for book three, which I will eagerly wait for.

 

 

Another Brooklyn

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Another Brooklyn, Book Reviews, fiction

I devoured, while trying to savor, Jacqueline Woodson’s “adolescent” novel, Brown Girl Dreaming, so pre-ordered her novel, Another Brooklyn, when I heard it was being published.

It is a slender book and I quickly read it. Overall, it was a lovely and touching story of a young woman named August growing up and Brooklyn –  her denial over her mother’s death, her close friendships, her father’s conversion to Islam, love and heartbreak and the search for oneself. I had a bit of trouble keeping track of her three friends and their fates as Woodson jumped back in and forth in time in the telling of the story and had to check back to make sure I hadn’t missed anything.

But Another Brooklyn leaves a lasting imprint of a quiet beauty and I yearn to read her next book.

Mom’s House, Dad’s House

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Book Reviews, Divorce, Mom's House Dad's House, non-fiction, Parenting

For my clients who are experiencing a divorce or break up of relationship involving children, it is always nice to give them a recommendation for resources. This is one of my favorites when starting the separation and divorce process and focuses on getting the smoothest transition for the kids.

Title: Mom’s House, Dad’s House: Making Two Homes for Your Child

Author: Isolina Ricci, Ph.D.

Things I liked:

• Great practical advice and the author touches on many of the issues separating families face, from ground rules to legal issues to long-distance parenting
• Feels like a great “how to”- including lots of bullet points and information in boxes which makes it great to skim and find what relates to your situation or at that point in the divorce
• It feels honest and normalizes so much of the experience of creating two homes for children
• “Watch your Language,”  and “Retreat from Intimacy” are two of my favorite chapters, if both parents read only those two chapters I think it could make a difference.
• I also really appreciated the idea of the “second wave” of emotions (she calls them flashbacks) in the chapter “Moving On.” It really normalizes that even when you think all the work is done, new situations and stages can bring up old or new feelings.

Things I didn’t like:

• There’s not much I didn’t like, some of the  suggestions were  outdated, for example writing things down in a letter would obviously be handled via email and the author doesn’t address text messaging —  let’s all be honest, text messaging creates headaches and misunderstandings in even the best relationships so it can cause problems when communicating about charged issues.

Best takeaway:

I share with many of my parents the idea that there needs to be a shift from intimacy to a business-like relationship and I think her recommendations on achieving that are great. When you apply those parameters, especially in the early stages, it can be protective and help you set clear boundaries. While we have this idealistic view of co-parenting, the practical advice in this book is one I truly appreciate because separating and creating two homes for a child is hard and emotional work.

Note: there is a children’s version of this book that I have not read yet.