Friday 5ive- May 12, 2023

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly post featuring five things that caught my attention this week. The last few days have felt like summer in NYC with temperatures in the 70s and high 80s today. At least the rain has stopped.

1)  While in Sarasota last weekend we stopped in to see the Corvette Show in St. Armand's Circle. There were Corvettes as far as the eye could see, from some very cool older models from the 1960s through the latest iteration the C8 model. 

2)  The Pulitzer Prizes were awarded this week and I was thrilled to hear that Barbara Kingsolver's novel Demon Copperhead won the Fiction prize, along with Hernan Diaz for his novel Trust. It was the first time that two novels were awarded the Pulitzer in the same year. I declared Demon Copperhead the best novel I read in 2022 back in October. It's a reimagining of Charles Dickens' David Copperfield set in Appalachia at the beginning of the opioid epidemic. I think everyone should read Demon Copperhead, it gives the reader an eye-opening look at poverty, the foster care system, and how we got where we are today. The characters are unforgettable and the writing is superb. Congratulations to Barbara Kingsolver, I have read every one of her books and this one is my favorite.

3)  I saw the powerful Tom Stoppard play Leopoldstadt on Broadway this week. Set in Vienna, it traces the life of a joyous extended Jewish family beginning in 1899 and ending in 1955. The family owns a textile factory, and as the plays opens we see them all celebrating Christmas and Hanukkah, even decorating a tree. The proud head of the family Hermann is played wonderfully by Joshua Malina (The West Wing, Scandal). We see them grow and prosper as the years go by, but we also see the undercurrent of anti-Semitism that grows stronger as we get closer to WWI. Austria fought with Germany in WWI and after they lost the war, economic times became tougher with more restrictions, and Jewish people were easy targets for people's anger. We move forward toward WWII, and the Nazi Party has made inroads into Austria, and we see the family living in poverty and fear of being forced from their home and into concentration camps. Leopoldstadt is an important play, and as the tension grew for the family, you could hear a pin drop in the theater as everyone was holding their breath when the Nazi officials came to the family home. It reminded me of seeing The Normal Heart about the AIDS crisis, the audience is just stunned into silence. The play is nominated for many Tony Awards, including Best Play and Best Featured Actor for Brandon Uranowitz, whose performance in the last scene is astonishing. (Joshua Malina is unfortunately ineligible for Tony consideration as he did not originate the role, but he is worthy of one.) If you are in NYC, go see this brilliant show before it closes in July. 

4) The HBO Max series Succession is wrapping up its last season, and wow, it is going out with a bang. The question of who will run the Wayco company is anyone's guess, with the three Roy siblings, played by Jeremy Strong, Sarah Snook and Kieran Culkin, all jockeying for the role. There was one scene this week that everyone is talking about- daughter Shiv (Sarah Snook) and her estranged husband Tom (portrayed by the fabulous Matthew MacFadyen) having the fight of all fights out on their apartment balcony while inside a pre-election night party is in full swing. That is a masterclass in acting. How will this all end??? I can't wait to see. 

5)  I read a few books this week. Kirsten Pursell's intriguing novel, Long Enough to Love You, is about Jenn, a woman facing an empty nest after her children are away in college and ready to start their lives. She gave up her career to raise them, and now that she is not needed as a sports team mom or PTA President she has to decide whether to stay with her reliable but emotionally unavailable husband or go out on her own. When she finds a diary from her younger days, she contemplates looking for a former love. This one will resonate with some women, and my full review will post on May 31st. 

I also read a book now in paperback- Amanda Eyre Ward's suspense novel The Lifeguards. Set in a wealthy Austin suburb, three teen boys who have been friends since childhood and now lifeguard together come running home after finding the body of a dead young woman. They swear they didn't kill her or even know her but as the book progresses we discover that not everyone is telling the truth, including the moms of the boys. Whitney is the leader of the pack, a wealthy mom of twins, who will do anything to protect her son. Annette is a Mexican woman (also married to a wealthy man) who is happiest working at a local daycare center and is attracted to her coworker. Liza is a single mom living on the economic edge who is hiding secrets about her identity from everyone, including her son whom she fiercely loves. Everyone here has secrets. I'm not sure if it was the right book to read on Mother's Day week, but it did keep me guessing. 

I'm wishing all the Moms out there a very Happy Mother's Day. I hope you get to stay in your pajamas all day and read a good book or two.

The Most Compelling Books of 2022

Reprinted from auburnpub.com

It’s the time of year for the Most Compelling Books of 2022. These are books that I still think about even months after I finished reading them, books with unforgettable characters and writing that takes my breath away.

Barbara Kingsolver is a writer whose works I never miss, and her new novel, Demon Copperhead is her best one yet. She takes on a classic- Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield- and sets her story about an orphan boy in Appalachia, as she tackles the topics of addiction, poverty, the foster care system, and the beginnings of the opioid crisis. I am not the only reviewer to pick this as the best book of the year. 

I read a great deal of historical fiction, and Adriana Trigiani’s moving epic about the importance of family stories The Good Left Undone, takes the reader from WWII Italy, France, and Scotland as Matelda, the matriarch of the Cabrelli family, shares her mother’s long-lost love story with her children and granddaughter so that it will not be forgotten. Every detail here is perfect. 

 

Anthony Marra’s Mercury Pictures Presents is also an epic about a young Italian woman who flees WWII to Los Angeles where she ends up working in the motion picture industry. Marra’s characters are so well-drawn they feel real, and his story is engrossing. 

Melissa Fu’s Peach Blossom Spring is set in 1930s China as Japan’s aggression forces Meilin and her young son to flee their home. They become separated from their family and Meilin does anything she has to in order to keep her son safe. When he grows up, he moves to the United States but Meilin stays behind. It’s a powerful story of a mother’s sacrifice for her son.

John Searles’ superb suspense novel, Her Last Affair is set at an abandoned drive-in theater as a blind widow rents out a cabin to a mysterious man, and a married woman reconnects on Facebook with a high school boyfriend. How Sayles cleverly connects these three characters at the end had me gasping. 

Another book that connects its characters in a clever manner is Fiona Mozely’s  brilliant Hot Stew about a group of people who are affected when a developer decides to sell a building in Soho in London to put up luxury condos. The tenants, including two women who run a brothel there, band together to defeat his plan. 

Matt Cain’s charming The Secret Life of Albert Entwistle is the feel-good book of the year. Albert is a lonely postman facing retirement in a small English town. He decides to confide in his coworkers about his life and makes a friend in a young single mom on his route. This beautiful story restores your faith in humanity. 

Jennifer Close’s Marrying the Ketchups is a wonderful story about a family who owns an Irish family restaurant in a Chicago suburb. When the patriarch passes away suddenly, there is a void and a decision about who should run the restaurant- the cousin who has been doing most of the work or the daughter who returns home from New York? I love a good Irish family story and throw in a family business and I’m in. 

Another foodie-novel I liked is Natalie Caña’s romance A Proposal They Can’t Refuse about two grandfathers who play matchmaker with their grandchildren- Kamilah, who is trying to save her family’s Puerto Rican restaurant, and Liam, who runs his family’s brewery next door. I love the combination of food, family businesses, and hot romance in this enemies-to-lovers novel. 

I read two nonfiction books that are outstanding. Laura L. Engel’s heartbreaking You’ll Forget This Ever Happened is a memoir about her experience after becoming pregnant in high school in the 1960s. She was sent to a home for unwed mothers where she was forced to give up her baby and it scarred her for life. It’s a searing book. 

Vanity Fair writer Marie Brenner was given unprecedented access as she wrote The Desperate Hours about the beginnings of the COVID pandemic in New York City as seen through the eyes of doctors, nurses, administrators, and patients on the front lines at New York-Presbyterian Hospital. It’s a harrowing story well-told. 

Three books I read in 2022 to look for in 2023- Amy Poeppels’ charming The Sweet Spot, Lauren Willig’s fantastic historical novel, Two Wars And A Wedding, 
 and Mary Beth Keane’s amazing novel The Half Moon. 

I wish you all a very happy holiday season.

Friday 5ive- October 21, 2022

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly-ish post featuring five things that caught my attention this week.

1) Sunday was a beautiful day in NYC so we took a walk through Central Park. It was so good to see the park filled with people, and it seemed like everyone was celebrating a birthday, we ran into mutliple celebrations..

2) The Center for Fiction hosted a discussion between Silas House, about his book Lark Ascending, and one of my favorite authors, Barbara Kingsolver, about her novel Demon Copperhead. I read an early copy of Demon Copperhead, and it is Kingsolver's best book yet, a contemporary retelling of Charles Dickens' David Copperfield. Her young protagonist deals with a mother who is an addict, living in a broken foster care system, poverty and the beginnings of the opioid crisis in Appalachia. I haven't read Silas House's book yet, but it sounds fascinating. It's a dystopian story about a young man who leaves the United States for Ireland, seeking refuge from devastating fires and political persecution  where he walks across the country with a dog he finds. The discussion was fascinating about two epic books, and what it means to be a writer from Appalachia. I watched it on YouTube, but I wish I had been there in person.

3) I love getting book mail, and this week I received my Stories & Suspects box filled with fantastic mystery books from Bantam. It features the new book from Susan Elia MacNeal, Mother Daughter Traitor Spy, about a mother-daughter duo living in Los Angeles during WWII who end up spying on people involved in the Nazi movement for the US government. It has a lot of resonance for events happening today. It also has a new crime drama  by William Landay (I liked his Defending Jacob), a psychological suspense from Catherine Steadman (The Family Game- a Book of the Month selection for October), a locked room mystery by Jilly Gagnon (All Dressed Up), and their Buzz Pick, a debut novel from Erin E. Adams titled Jackal about missing girls in a Rust Belt town. The box was sponored by Tony's Chocolonely, one of my favorite chocolate treats.

4) Stanley Tucci's Searching for Italy is back on Sunday nights on CNN, and we are enjoying traveling to the different regions of Italy. The first few episodes took us Calabria, Sardinia and Puglia and we've seen a lot of seafood dishes this season. 

5)  I adore Mary Beth Keane's books, and her upcoming 2023 novel, The Half Moon, is wonderful. Malcolm and Jess are a happy couple living in Gillam, a small town a hour upstate from New York City. Jess desperately wants a baby, and after several expensive and emotionally draining IVF tries doesn't undertstand why Malcolm is willing to give up on their dream. Malcolm's dream is to own the Half Moon, a bar he has worked in for years. They are at a crossroads, and the novel explores how that came to be and where it is headed. It is  phenomenal, I read it a little bit at a time because I did not want this fantastic book to end. I wanted to stay with Malcolm and Jess forever. 

Have a great, safe, healthy week.

Friday 5ive- May 13, 2022

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly-ish blog post featuring five things that caught my attention. Happy Friday the 13th- look our for black cats and don't walk under any ladders.

1)  I received an invitation to my niece's baby shower, and included in the invitation is this adorable card "Books for Baby". Like many baby showers, guests are asked to bring a book for the baby. What is really great is that we are asked to bring a book that has special meaning for us, something we loved as a child, or something that will remind the baby of us. We are asked to sign the book to the baby as well. I squealed with joy when I read this card, it is the best idea I have seen in a long time.

2)  Our neighborhood Italian grocery store, Agata & Valentina just opened a Gluten-Free and Organics smaller grocery store across the street from their main store. I ,haven't been in it yet, but I think that is a terrific concept that will work well in our bustling neighborhood. 

3) I watched two author book events on Zoom. The first was hosted by Books In Common NW with author Claire Lombardo interviewing Bonnie Garmus about Bonnie's debut novel, Lessons in Chemistry. Everyone I know has been raving about the book.  Set in the 1960s, it tells the story of a female research chemist who finds herself the host of a popular cooking show on TV. The interview was terrific, Claire had insightful questions, and Bonnie's description of how she came to write the book was one many women can relate to- she was in a meeting at work and spoke up about an idea she had. She got no response from the group, but when a man immediately repeated her idea as his own, the team loved it. She called him out on it, but he denied it. She went back to her office and began to write the first chapter. I'm excited for this one, one of my Book of the Month selections. It was a fascinating discussion.

One of my other Book of the Month selections was Jennifer Close's Marrying the Ketchups, about a family who owns a restaurant. Jennifer was in conversation with author Lauren Fox at Boswell Book Company about the book, which I chose because my husband and I owned two fast-food restaurants in another life and it sounds perfect for me.  I  enjoy a good family story, and listening to Jennifer talk about the multiple narrators and the storyline had me moving this one up to the top of my TBR list.

4) We watched the last season of Neflix's Ozark. Oh, I had a pit in my stomach the entire time. There was so much tension wondering how they were going to wind up the story of the Byrde family, trying desperately to get out from under the control of the Navarro drug cartel, no matter what the cost. Do they succeed? You have to watch. The addition of Richard Thomas as Wendy Byrde's father was brilliant casting. He's come a long way from his John-Boy Walton days. 

5) I read two amazing books this week. Kirsten Miller's The Change, a Good Morning America Reads pick for May, has great timing. It's a novel about three middle-aged women who find they each are called to avenge the deaths of young women in their wealthy Long Island community. Nessa is a widow now experiencing empty nest syndrome when her twin daughters go to college. Nessa hears the voices of dead people, who lead her to where their bodies are. It is a "gift" she inherits from her grandmother. Jo owns a women-only gym in town, and her trip through menopause leaves her with an incredible physical strength. Harriet "retired" from her career as an advertising director when she is unfairly passed over for a well-deserved promotion, given instead to an unqualified man. The townspeople believe Harriet is a witch because she has turned her previously well-attended landscaping into a wild grown jungle. The women band together to discover who killed the three young women who called out to Nessa. These women use their righteous anger to right wrongs. It's a mystery-thriller-revenge fantasy that is so well-written, and the main characters are fascinating I highly recommend it. 

The other book I read is Barbara Kingsolver's upcoming October release, Demon Copperhead. The story takes its inspiration from Charles Dicken's David Copperfield, with young Damon living in poverty with his young single mother in Appalachian coal country. Damon has to struggle his entire life through bad foster care situations, homelessness, enforced child labor, and eventually finding a talent for football. The voice of Damon is unforgettable as he narrates the ups and many downs of his life, through loss and love and the scourge of rampant pill drug abuse foisted on the people in his rural community by a powerful pharmaceutical company. It's a big book, over 500 pages, and an important book, destined to be as classic as Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible, one of my all-time favorite novels. Make sure to put Demon Copperhead on your radar this fall. I will be talking this one up all summer long.

Have a great week, stay safe and healthy.

Two of Fall's Best Books

Reprinted from the Citizen:

Fall is a big season for publishers, one in which books with high hopes for success hit the shelves. Two books that fit that category are by a well-respected author of fiction, essays and nonfiction, and a debut author whose name is well-known to anyone who has followed television and movies for the last 40 years.

The debut author is actress Sally Field, who took seven years to write her memoir In Pieces. 

Field grew up in a decidedly female household with her mother, grandmother and great-aunts, all strong women. She tells some of their fascinating stories, explaining how they got to be where they were. It will inspire the reader to talk to their own mothers and grandmothers about their life experiences.

The biggest influence on Field’s life was her beautiful mother, an actress who had a modest film career. Field had a complicated relationship with her mother growing up, made more so when her mother married an actor/stuntman, Jock Mahoney. Mahoney sexually abused Sally at a young age, and that relationship resonated with her for the rest of her life.

As Mahoney’s Hollywood fortunes waned, Sally’s interest in acting earned her a starring role in the 1960s sitcom “Gidget.” It was a good first experience, but her second television show, “The Flying Nun,” was a deeply unhappy one.

She didn’t want to do it, but Jock convinced her that she may never work again and she needed to take the job. After a few desperately unfulfilling years there, she was introduced to the Actors Studio, where she came alive. She studied and worked hard to become a serious actress.

Field details the highs and lows in her personal and professional life, from her marriage at a young age and subsequent divorce to raising her three sons and working to get the kind of serious roles she wanted.

From her breakout role as a severely mentally ill woman in “Sybil” to her Academy Award-winning performance in “Norma Rae” to her very complicated relationship with actor Burt Reynolds, Field lays it all on the line in an honest portrait of her life.

Although her mother had a drinking problem as Sally grew up, it was her mother she turned to when she needed someone to care for her sons when she worked. And her mother was there for her and her sons at every turn.

She ends the book trying to understand her mother, what drove her and why they had such a complicated relationship. In Pieces is an indelible portrait of a woman we all thought we knew.

Barbara Kingsolver has written some of the best books of the past 30 years, most notably The Poisonwood Bible. She writes about big issues as illuminated by her brilliantly conceived characters. 

Her latest, Unsheltered, tells a story that many people can relate to today. Willa Knox is a middle-aged mother of two grown children, happily married to Iano, a college professor she has loved forever.

When Iano’s college closes, they are forced to move to New Jersey, where Iano found a one-year teaching position at a small college. His very ill father, Nick, lives with them, a man who loves cable news and talk radio and loudly, and profanely blames anyone different from himself for the woes of the country.

Soon their son Zeke arrives with a new baby in tow, progressive daughter Tig comes home after two years incommunicado, and life becomes more difficult, made even more so by the fact that the home left to Willa by her aunt is literally falling down around them.

Willa lost her job when the magazine she wrote for folded, and money is tight. She discovers that their home may have historical classification, and she begins to research the previous owners in hopes of saving it, and them.

Thatcher Greenwood was a science professor who lived in the home after the Civil War. He believed in the work of Charles Darwin, which caused him trouble with his own family and the townspeople of Vineland. People believed Darwin's science was sacrilegious, and it frightened them.

Kingsolver writes brilliantly and beautifully in a novel that touches the reader emotionally and rationally. Her characters feel like real people (and some of the historic ones are), and the relationships between them (especially Iano and Willa) are moving. She really nails the family dynamic, especially in times like these when it can be problematic.

If you read

BOOK: In Pieces by Sally Field

GRADE: A

PUBLISHER: Grand Central Publishing

COST: Hardcover, $29

LENGTH: 417 pages

---

BOOK: Unsheltered by Barbara Kingsolver

GRADE: A+

PUBLISHER: Harper

COST: Hardcover, $29.99

LENGTH: 480 pages

The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver

The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver
Published by Harper Collins ISBN# 978-0-06-085257-3
Hardcover, $26.99

One of my all-time favorite books is Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible, about a family of American missionaries in the Belgian Congo in 1959, about the time of the end of colonialism in Africa. Kingsolver draws the reader into an unfamiliar world, with interesting, yet flawed, characters.


Her latest novel, The Lacuna, tells the story of Harrison Shepherd, a young boy born to an American father and Mexican mother. His mother leaves his father to chase after a wealthy landowner in Mexico, with Harrison in tow. Harrison sees a unique woman in a market, and ends up befriending Frida Kahlo before she becomes a famous artist. Harrison shows a talent for mixing plaster, and Frida's lover, Diego Rivera, hires Harrison to work for him.


Harrison becomes immersed in their artistic and political world. Artists are notoriously difficult, and Frida and Diego fit that stereotype. Through them, he meets Leo Trotsky, the exiled Russian Communist leader. Trotsky trusts few people, and Harrison becomes one of them, so he works for Trotsky.


When Trotsky is murdered in front of him, Harrison heads back to the United States to live. He is an enigma to his neighbors, and even more so after he writes a novel that becomes a best seller. His Communist party ties come back to haunt him as the US government is beginning to ferret out the dangerous Communists in their midst.


I read this book for Books in the City Immigrant Stories Challenge and it fits the bill doubly. Shepherd is an immigrant in both of the countries he lived in, and at home in neither. Although born in the US, he spent much of his youth and young adulthood in Mexico, where he was considered a gringo. When he came back to the US, he was unfamiliar with American customs and way of life. He was a man without a country.


I enjoyed how Kingsolver used real historical characters and events to tell Harrison's story. I was fairly unfamiliar with Kahlo and Rivera's life and work, and although I knew a little more about Trotsky's life, I learned so much about that period of time, much like I did when I read The Poisonwood Bible. 


The story is told through the diaries that Shepherd kept, along with some commentary from his secretary, Mrs. Brown, who is a wonderful character. She wanted Shepherd's story to be told, and was unwavering in her loyalty to her boss.


My favorite part of the story was Shepherd's fight to clear his name. The parallels between the poisoned, fearful political atmosphere in the 1950's, and the political atmosphere of today are intriguing. Either you are with us or you are against us, and if you are against us, you are not a patriot. All of the name calling on the cable news shows- calling anyone who wants universal health care a socialist, for example- while reading this book, you know the more things change, the more they sadly stay the same.


The Lacuna is one of the best books I have read this year. There is so much to ponder and ruminate over, and the historical setting and characters make this novel a dream for history buffs and lovers of great literature.

Rating 5 of 5 stars