“I realized that, while I would never be my mother nor have her life, the lesson she had left me was that it was possible to love and care for a man and still have at your core a strength so great that you never even needed to put it on display.” – Anna Quindlen

Still obsessed with Anna Quindlen, I went back and reread my favorite of her books, One True Thing. This is the story of a daughter who discovers who her mother really is when it’s almost too late. This Sunday is Mother’s Day. I thought I would suggest you read it or, if you already have, read it again. First, buy a box of tissue. You’re going to need them.

Daughters fall into two categories: those who want to be like their mothers and those who don’t. Brilliant, driven, self-admittedly cold, Ellen Gulden definitely does not. It is her father who she idolizes and wants to be like. And, it is his approval she craves. This need succeeds in dragging her from her exciting job as a journalist in New York  City back to Langhorne, the college town where she was raised, to care for her dying mother. Not a role she wants, she does it for “Papa”, not her mother.

Reluctantly, with a bitterness that makes the reader wince, she steps into her mother’s shoes and attempts to run George Gulden’s house so that his world is disturbed as little as possible by the messiness of his wife’s dying. It’s all about George. Thoroughly unlikeable, it is only when Quindlen makes it possible to see him through the  loving eyes of his wife that the reader is able to view him in a kinder light.

While the men, George, Ellen’s boyfriend Jonathan, and Ellen’s brothers, Jeff and Brian, play a role in this book, it is a mother-daughter story. Ellen learns the the cliche is true. You can’t  tell a book by its cover. Sweet Kate Gulden, baker of pies, refinisher of furniture, reader of garish romance novels is not who Ellen dismissively thought she was. It is this discovery, played out against the relentless timetable of Kate’s dying, that will keep you reading until you’ve turned the last page. You may wonder if Kate and Ellen are really so different, after all.

One True Thing was published in 1994, before cell phones, laptops, Facebook and Twitter, but there is a timelessness about the story that makes it as readable today as it was then. All women have a mother and many also have a daughter. It should remind us all to look deeper.

As a writer, I can only wonder how much of Ellen is Anna. Only Quindlen knows for sure, but  her experience caring for her own dying mother informs this story and makes it very real to her readers.

I also bought the movie  (at my fingertips in the iTunes Stores) and watched as Meryl Streep and Renee Zellweger brought Kate and Ellen to the screen. Both performances are flawless. We are talking about Meryl, after all. But the story, as it so often is, was changed for the movie. The book is better, but I always think that it is.

If you do read this book, I hope it reminds  you, this Sunday, when you stop to think about your own mother, to take a moment and let her out of the neat little box where you may have so lovingly placed her, and wonder who she really is or was.

One True Thing is dedicated to Prudence M. Quindlen, Anna’s mother.

Get your tissues ready.

“Nothing you become will disappoint me; I have no preconception that I’d like to see you be or do. I have no desire to forsee you, only to discover you. You can’t disappoint me” ― Mary Haskell

Defending Jacob is a story about a man who loves his son.

What parent has not struggled against the news that his or her child has done something wrong? Lying, cheating on a test, unkindness to a friend or classmate, rudeness to a teacher – a parent’s first reaction is always, “not my kid.”

Assistant District Attorney Andy Barber insists that his son, Jacob, is innocent when he is accused of murdering a classmate. His horror and disbelief would resonate with almost any reader, but if you are a parent, this is enough to keep you reading until the book’s shocking conclusion.

Set in the affluent Boston suburb of Newton, Massachusetts, the story unfolds as fourteen-year-old Jacob is arrested and brought to trial for the murder of  Ben Rifkin. William Landay, a former district attorney, breathes authenticity into the legal aspects of the book that could only come from the halls of Boston College Law, his alma mater, and from his years of practicing criminal law.This is not a book where you will find irritating mistakes describing the way things are done.

Integral to this story of a family coming to terms with the unfathomable is the question of the possibility of inheriting a “murder gene”.  Is young Jacob his murderous paternal grandfather’s true heir?

Defending Jacob is a brilliantly executed story that builds to a conclusion that was, at least for me, totally unexpected and, at the same time, understandable.

The question that lingers long after you finish the last page is: To what lengths will a parent go to save his or her child? To what length would I go to save my own?

I think you will find yourself unable to put this one down.

“It’s that we’ve done a pretty good job of becoming ourselves, and that this is, in so many ways the time of our lives.” – Anna Quindlen

I admit that I relate to Anna Quindlen because we both were good little Catholic girls of Irish and Italian extraction, born in the 1950s. We came of age in the long shadow cast by the Vietnam War when America’s values were changing at a dizzying pace. We were the first generation of girls who voiced our belief that we had the right to be or do whatever we wanted to. I know because I was there and I remember.

Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake, Quindlen’s new memoir, is written, first and foremost, for the girls of the fifties. In it Quindlen talks about what it meant to her to be a young woman making her way through those times. She also talks about how she  feels now as she approaches sixty, reflecting on what she has achieved and where she is today.

Anna Quindlen is a writer’s writer. She won the Pulitzer Prize for her New York Times column, “Public and Private”. She has written five best-selling novels, three of which have been made into movies. One True Thing (1994) is about a daughter called home from her exciting career in New York City to care for her dying mother. The movie version of the book stars Meryl Streep and Renee Zellweger. She has written numerous other essays, stories and opinion pieces and holds many honorary degrees.  She is, as the saying goes, the real deal.

When you learn that at the age of nineteen, Anna Quindlen left Barnard to care for her own mother, dying of ovarian cancer at age forty, a light goes on. Oh. Really. Here again is another example of a writer’s life experience informing her work. The heart of the pathos, so beautifully captured in One True Thing, is explained in Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake.

The reason that I love to write about women is that I feel that women, more so than men, carry parts of their mothers and grandmothers forward with them. Much has been written about the fact the many women today have chosen to leave their careers, enabled by expensive college educations, many at schools that once only admitted men. Instead, they choose to stay home, raise their babies and bake cupcakes as many of their grandmothers did. Many of their grandmothers did not have the right to make that choice.

Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake is Anna Quindlen’s own story, but at the same time it the story of a generation’s struggle to make sure that women have choices. We fought for them. As one of those demur little white-gloved girls, frequently told to “ sit still and be good”, I am thrilled to be able to tell my granddaughters, “You can be anything that you want to be. Go for it.”

I loved Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake. Let me know what you think of it, if you decide to read it.

Enjoy!

“Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart.”  – William Wordsworth”

I write these recommendations from the perspective of a reader but I read the books with the eyes of a writer. Every reader follows authors whose work they love and eagerly await. If you are a re-reader like I am, you pacify yourself by reading again the books the author has already written. This is how I feel about Barbara O’Neal who also writes as Barbara Samuel.

Her latest book, The Garden of Happy Endings, is about a group of people, each with his or her own problems, banding together to create a community garden in an abandoned lot next to San Roque ‘s Catholic Church.

It contains all the signature elements that you will find in Barbara’s books: damaged people wrestling with messy problems, mystical dreams and visions, tantalizing food that makes you want to go find something to eat while reading, and dogs who steal your heart.

Set in Pueblo, Colorado, The Garden of Happy Endings carries an authenticity that comes from the fact that Barbara is a Colorado native who continues to live in that part of the state. It is a story about two sisters, Thomasina (Tamsin) and Elsa –named after a cat and a lion– who find themselves living once again in the modest house where they were raised. Elsa, a recovering Catholic, driven by the fact that she was forbidden to be a priest to become a Unity minister, is facing a crisis of faith. Tamsin, the beautiful sister, is confronted by the dawning realization that her marriage, along with all the comfort and security it has provided, is not what she thought it was. Working together, each sister finds her way back to a life that is both meaningful and joyous.

Deftly woven throughout the story, you will meet three delightful little boys, an earnest priest who once was in love with Elsa, a sexy contractor who is desperately trying to make amends for past sins, Tamsin’s spoiled daughter, Alexa, and an medicine man named Joseph.

It would not be a Barbara O’Neal book without the dogs. Charlie, the flat-coated retriever, is the star, but it is the elderly black lab named Joe who got to me. If you have ever had a dog you have watched grow old, you will love him, too.

Barbara O’Neal’s books often contain elements of the mystical, crossing easily between the worlds of the living and the dead. The Garden of Happy Endings is no exception. This book contains that and more.

Finally, there is appendix that lists the recipes that are mentioned throughout the book.

In the last two weeks, I have offered you a novel based on an ancient Greek poem and an admittedly disturbing story of a post-apocalyptic dystopia. The Garden of Happy Endings is my idea of pure comfort reading. I hope you walk away, as I always do, from reading Barbara O’Neal’s books believing that it is possible to make a difference in some small way and that life is essentially good because in my heart I believe that it is.

Make sure you get a snack to go with this.

I love all Barbara’s books but my favorite remains A Piece of Heaven written under the name of Barbara Samuel. If you like this one, then I encourage you to read it. I don’t think you will be sorry.

Now I am going out to buy the ingredients to make Elsa’s Split Pea and Barley Soup. 

“Most human beings have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted. That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons of history.” ― Aldous Huxley

I hesitated before deciding to review Pure by Julianna Baggott. It is not for the faint of heart even though it was originally written for the Young Adult (YA) audience. Many scenes are very disturbing. Not because they are graphic but rather because they portray horror almost but not quite beyond the imagination.

I decided to do it for two reasons. First, this novel illustrates what I love about being a writer. Julianna Baggott, the author of seventeen books, also writes as N.E. Bodie and as Bridget Asher. N.E. Bodie writes for preteens and Bridget Asher writes deliciously romantic women’s fiction. Clearly, Ms Baggott writes about what she wants to as the muse calls her, proving herself to be an incredibly talented and prolific writer. This, as you may have already guessed, is every writer’s dream.

The second reason is that buried deep in the acknowledgements – I know you don’t probably read them but trust me a writer always does – I found the following:

“The research for this novel led me to the accounts of the effects of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki…And I hope, in general, that Pure directs people to nonfiction accounts of the atomic bomb – horrors we cannot afford to forget.”

And now, on to Pure.

“A great gorgeous whirlwind of a novel, boundless in its imagination. You will be swept away.” — Justin Cronin, New York Times bestselling author of THE PASSAGE

Pure is a story about Pressia, a sixteen-year old girl living with her grandfather in the remains of a barbershop in post-apocalyptic America. She is one of the Wretches, survivors of a nuclear blast known as the Detonations. The blast left those who survived burned, mutilated and fused to whatever they were holding or standing near at the time it happened. Pressia’s grandfather has a fan embedded in this throat and Pressia’s right hand is now a plastic doll’s head. Shortly after the novel opens, she is forced to flee the dreaded OSR solders who are assigned to round up all children when they reach their sixteenth birthday.

Pure also describes those who were saved. Known as the Pures, they live an isolated life in the Dome. Partridge, the son of one of the leaders, escapes to try and find his mother said to have been killed when the bright light of the atomic blast took place.

This is the story of what happens when Partridge and Pressia collide in the desolate and dangerous landscape of the world outside the Dome. The plot has some very interesting twists; some you might expect to find if you read this genre and one amazing turn that will leave you breathless. It is the characters that grab you and won’t leave you: Bradwell, the boy with birds fused to his back, Lyda Mertz, El Captain and his brother Helmut, The Good Mother, Sedge and many more.

If you like pleasant and happy books, Pure is probably not for you. It is the first of trilogy. And the movies rights have been sold. Coming on the heels of the amazing success of The Hunger Games, we can most likely expect to see a lot more of Pressia.

One reason you might want to read this book is that your children and grandchildren probably already have.

Whose brave enough to read it?

Does anyone besides me wonder why these dystopian novels have such great appeal to the young adult audience?

“We come from a dark abyss, we end in a dark abyss, and we call the luminous interval life.”

― Nikos Kazantzakis

The Greeks, really? Really!

I was not a fan of Homer. I read The Iliad in high school, took a few tests on it and forgot most of the story. Recalling only, as many do, the beauteous kidnapped Helen whose face launched a thousand ships. I think what drew me to read Madeline Miller’s The Song of Achilles was the fact that my father loved the stories of the ancient Greeks. I thought maybe the story in novel form would help me understand why.

A first novel for Madeline Miller, taking her ten years to write, it retells in prose, The Iliad’s recounting of the Trojan War. One of history greatest love stories, it details the boyhood friendship and ultimately the love between Achilles, the son of King Peleus and the sea-nymph Thetis and the exiled prince, Patroclus.

I admire Miller’s courage in taking on not only the challenge of writing this story as a novel but in writing it in the first person, from the point of view of Patroclus. Writing in the first person is not for the faint heart. Miller is a Greek and Latin scholar whose meticulous research forms the backbone of her book and more than qualifies her to have written it.

The pages are full of riveting characters: fierce Thetis, Chiron, the good centaur who mentors both Achilles and Patroclus, Briseis the slave girl who comes between Achilles and Patroclus, greedy Agamemnon, soulless Pyrrhus, and finally, Achilles, himself, called “Aristos Achaion” – “The Best of the Greeks”.

The Song of Achilles transforms a story that many modern readers find difficult to comprehend in it original form, making it easy to read and understand. The love scenes between Patroclus and Achilles were both effective and tastefully done but at the same time complete.

It contains all the elements today’s readers look for in a story: passion, betrayal, loyalty, love, brutal battles, heroes and villains. I recommend that you read it if you are looking for something a little bit different.

If you live in New Hampshire, Madeline Miller is reading at Gibson’s Bookstore in Concord on April 12 at 7 PM.

As for my question as to why my father would have liked it, he was fascinated by fate being no stranger to it himself. The Song of Achilles is full of it.

Follow the Greeks to Troy.

“ It’s a funny thing, but today the Titanic is probably much more – that is people are much more aware of it than they were in 1954, when I was doing my research.” – Walter Lord, author of A Night to Remember

April 15^th is the hundredth anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic. That alone was enough to draw me to Kate Alcott’s, The Dressmaker. I love reading historical fiction set in this period and extending through the 1940’s. I think this is because it provides glimpse into the times that my grandparents and parents lived their lives as young people.

The Dressmaker is historical fiction at its best. Alcott places a fictional character, Tess Collins, a talented seamstress, forced by circumstances into the role of a lady’s maid, into the path of a real Titanic passenger, Lady Lucille Duff-Gordon on the dock in Cherbourg, France waiting to board the ship. The story, fast-paced and laced with actual facts and real people, will keep you reading.

Due to the popularity of the movie most of us saw in 1997, the story of the Titanic’s ill-fated voyage is well known. Lucille Duff-Gordon, the non-fictional character at the heart of the book is not. She was a fashion designer, known as “Lucille” famous for her translucent, floating clothing in the early years of the twentieth century, who dressed royalty, rich women and movie stars. Also making a cameo in the story is her sister the writer, Elinor Glyn. The facts around Duff-Gordon’s escape from the sinking ship in Life Boat Number One and the resulting scandal are well researched and told with the added panache of a fiction writer’s color.

Equally interesting to me, especially in these controversial times, is the hope of the immigrant experience illustrated by the story of the fictional character, Tess Collins. It reminds me once again that so many of us, proud to call ourselves Americans today, are here because a grandparent or great-grandparent (Me – Irish, Italian and Swiss) made that scary crossing in the bottom of some ship.

From the writer’s perspective, The Dressmaker provides an interesting insight into what it takes to successfully sell a novel today. This book is actually the sixth novel written by Patricia O’Brien. Now in her seventies, O’Brien’s agent initially was unable to sell this book. It was only after O’Brien changed the writer’s name to that of a “new” unknown author, Kate Alcott, that she was successful. The Dressmaker written by Kate Alcott sold in three days. The result is a great read that helps to connect us with one of the sea’s most tragic and romantic stories.

Step onto the Titanic

I hope you enjoy it.

“The Lords of Elfland are true lords, the only true lords, the kind that do not exist on this earth: their lordship is the outer sign or symbol of real inward greatness. And greatness of soul shows when a man speaks. At least, it does in books. In life we expect lapses. In naturalistic fiction, too, we expect lapses, and laugh at an “over-heroic” hero. But… in fantasy, we need not compromise.”— Ursula Le Guin

Like every good English major, I read J.R.R. Tolkien but with that exception I came late to the world of fantasy fiction.

Warrior of the Three Moons, by J. Michael Robertson, the first book of The God Wars of Ithir Series, is the book that opened the door to fantasy for me. I got lost in this story flying from Boston to Boise on a business trip, barely noting when the plane began its decent.

Warrior of the Three Moons is the story of Ciaran, a young Scotti warrior, chosen by the Goddess, Danu, to be her champion in the battle against the forces of Darkness. In order to successfully fulfill his role, against seemingly insurmountable odds, Ciaran must first find the lost Sunspear. What makes this book stand out is the detail the author uses to sketch the richness of the world against which the story unfolds, replete with The Celtae, Ring Lords, Shadow Trolls, Skull Warriors, Shadow Priests, Elves, Faery Folk and Trollhounds. Interlaced at every turn of the plot throughout this story are the women: among others, Kiara, Ciaran’s shield sister, Scathach, the Blademaster, Rillsong, the Faery Princess, and Isengael, the Shadow Druidess. The characters are complex and believable giving depth to the story.

The writing is lyrical, lifting the story above the limitations of the genre. This comes as no surprise, as the author is also a published poet. At the same time,  the battle scenes are taut, written with a career military officer’s insights and expertise.

After finishing reading Warrior of the Three Moons, I went on to read all 11, 000 pages of Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time series and George R.R. Martin’ s A Song of Ice and Fire series. I enjoyed them both but neither  captivated me the way that Warrior of the Three Moons did. I am eagerly awaiting book two in this series.

If you have never read fantasy, this is a great book to start with. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

My key to the world of fantasy fiction

“The more you read, the more things you will know.” ― Dr. Seuss

I admit the first thing that caught my attention about Angelina’s Bachelors was the title. I was almost an Angelina myself. Yes, that’s right. Angelina Ferrari. It leaves no question as to my ethnic origins does it? But then, the decision to go with using both my grandmothers’ names instead was made and Angelina was set aside.

I also liked the cover. My mother had an apron almost identical to the one the woman in the picture is wearing. I have a soft spot for aprons, which from what I read, are coming back into style.

Finally, the subtitle:  A novel with food. This sold me the book. I love books with recipes. Twenty-three recipes are sprinkled throughout this book. Mostly Italian, they have names like: Stracotta, (Italian Pot Roast), Aubergine Napoleons, Lasagna Provencal, and Marinated Unagi (Eel!) over aborio rice patties. The recipes are the contribution of author, Brian O’Reilly’s wife, Virginia. I haven’t tried any of them yet but I intend to.

Most women’s fiction is written by women. I found the fact that the author was a man interesting, too. Brian O’Reilly is the creator and executive producer of Food Network’s Dinner: Impossible. There are several men in this story – the bachelors of the title – and he does an excellent job representing the male point of view. In the conversation with the author at the end of the book, he says that his wife provided the women’s perspective.

Set in the Italian neighborhood of South Philly around Passyunk Avenue, Angelina’s Bachelors is the story of a woman whose husband gets out of the bed at two am where he is sleeping next to her and sneaks into the kitchen to steal a forbidden chunk out of her amazing cake (Frangelico Chocolate Dream Cake and yes, the recipe is included). He then proceeds to drop dead.

“Sheer chocolaty pleasure. His last breath was a sigh of pure delight.”

The rest of the story is about how his widow, Angelina D’Angelo, survives his cruel and untimely death. The plot has an interesting twist or two and the Philly scenes combine to create a true sense of place.

This is a curl up with a cup of hot chocolate kind of book.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Angelina's Bachelors by Brian O'Reilly

How many of you like recipes in the books you read? Do you think that they take away from the story?