Original Beauty in The Language of Flowers

Interesting, heartfelt, original

A rare and beautiful book, The Language of Flowers is a perfect choice for book club.

Victoria is a product of the foster care system, an indignant young woman with no ambition or drive or even likability. She has never been adopted into a family, and will age out at age eighteen. This novel really made me think about what happens to all of the children who age out of the foster care system.

Placed at The Gathering House, the indignant Victoria is expected to get a job; she has 6 weeks to do so. To my chagrin, the obtuse Victoria doesn’t even try to find work which means that she must leave the gathering house. It is difficult to see someone who refuses to help or fight for herself, Victoria is her own worst enemy.

Hidden deep inside her brain, Victoria’s redeeming quality is a flower dictionary, her very own language of flowers. Victoria admits that she is a “thistle-peony-basil kind of girl” which translates into misanthropy, anger and hate; well the girl doth know herself. Eventually her talent with flowers is recognized and she is hired part time at a florist. Soon townspeople are asking for Victoria at the flower shop as she truly has a way with flowers. For the old man who wants his granddaughter to stop sulking Victoria creates a lily of the valley bouquet (return to happiness). The obstinate Victoria does not let things happen easily for herself but her life is a journey, and we all hope for a Victoria to have a Celandine, Cosmos, and Laurel life.

I don’t want to give too much away, you should read The Language of Flowers or pick this for your book club. And it really is quite fun to flip through the flower dictionary at the back of the book.

Book Club Ideas:

·         Quiches, Boursin Cheese and crackers, salad, cupcakes
·         Wine
·         Flowers—lots of flowers! (Trader Joes is a great resource)
·         Flower Trivia* (create it using the flower dictionary in the back of the book)
          *Have a bouquet prize!
·         Research your area Gathering Houses (they do exist), right before my book club the one in our local area opened, I had the article at the meeting.

The Bird Sisters, a Luminous Debut

Heartbreaking, endearing, delicate

The Bird Sisters used to have many visitors from near and far, those who had found injured birds and wanted the sisters to fix the broken wings. Milly and Twiss are spinsters, old ladies living in their childhood Wisconsin house, biding their time and anxiously awaiting visitors.  Lately, though, there haven’t been many visitors , which leads the isolated sisters to reminisce about their past.

Flitting back to 1947, Milly and Twiss are young teens living with their parents. Their lives are relatively normal   until their philandering father crashes his car and somehow loses his golfing skills—a family crisis as he was a Golf Pro. As their parents drift apart, their father starts living in the barn while their mother stays in her bedroom—everything is in a downward spiral. Financially the family is hurting, but their proud  mother refuses to accept the family’s new societal status, refusing assistance from the Sewing Society ladies.

Milly is the eldest, the level headed and sturdy sister who loves to bake. Townspeople scrape together flour and sugar just to ensure that her baking skills continue to develop. Twiss is the young wild child, the tomboy, the free spirit. With their absentee father (he stays in the barn all day) and their depressed mother, the sisters have to rely heavily on each other. Despite the house dysfunction, their cousin Bett, older at eighteen, soon arrives to spend the summer with them. Twiss doesn’t understand Bett, who is plain,  sickly,  and rather unlikeable, but their mother appreciates Bett’s household assistance. In true coming of Age style, by the end of the summer Milly Twiss and Bett will have had to grow up, their future fates decided.

The Bird Sisters is everything a novel should be, and beyond everything a debut novel should be. If only more writers wrote stories as intricate and luminous as this, The Bird Sisters is a Must-read. Reach for this Coming of Age novel for your summer read or as a pick for your next book club. 

Review: The Flight of Gemma Hardy

The Flight of Gemma Hardy by Margot Livesey

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



We are so lucky in this world; every month new classic novels are being created by brilliant minds. Margot Livesey is a new classics author, her novel The Flight of Gemma Hardy is impeccable and beautiful, a tale that should be savored. “Wow, Margot Livesey can write” was my thought as I finished the novel. As a non-author, those thoughts do not accurately convey my enthusiasm at the beauty, simplicity and skill with which Livesey imagined this novel gem.

The novel and the story will seem familiar to the reader, and the author admits it is based on the tale of Jane Eyre; there are many similarities. When her loving uncle dies, a young girl’s life is thrown into chaos. First Gemma is moved from her room to the attic, losing her place in the family, soon she is seen as a maid that the family deigns themselves to cloth and feed. A private school is where she is sent when her Aunt no longer wants her at all; Gemma is now an unwanted charity case. Gemma survives all that the oppressive world throws at her, despite being a penniless child in dark and unforgiving times.

I struggled with the timeline as this novel is set in 1960 Scotland, a setting that was hard to imagine as I envisioned an Oliver Twist/Jane Eyre era. Gemma is set adrift in a lonely world, where schoolgirls bully each other, where the evil headmaster reigns and friends are not an option. Cleaning and cooking and memories soon fill Gemma’s days, as do desires to go to school and eventually make a living on her own. Eventually the penniless Gemma will get a job as an au pair in the remote Orkney Islands, having to take the only job offered to her.

This is truly a novel that you will want to share with friends, family and your book club.





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Box Office FRESH: Let’s Get these Books to the Big Screen!

An Opinion: Movie-makers are not keeping up with reader/moviegoer desires

 Egad! Ugh! Really? They are making another Superman movie, and I am so not stoked about it, how many men have played superman at this point? And didn’t Toby McGuire just step out of his Spidey costume like last year and here we have a "new" Spiderman movie? Really? And I still remember The Great Gatsby with Robert Redford, now I hear that soon it will star Dicaprio-umm ok. Why are we constantly remaking the old—I want to see  a new voice at the theater.  I vote for freshness in a movie experience and here are some of my top book picks—listen up screenwriters and movie moguls! What do movie goers want? (HINT no more tired comic book heroes please)…

Action Adventure

Hawke by Ted Bell, stolen directly from my husband’s nightstand, would translate into a great action adventure movie. There is so much story and action in this book, plus a great new character of Hawke, an interesting jack of all trades spy guy! A perfect action hero with a new story!

Beach Road by James Patterson-- I chose this Patterson novel because it is a one off, it is not an Alex Cross novel. Beach Road is a combo of action, legal thriller, and drama with a twist. It could really be something at the box office if they cast the right male lead.

Sci Fi

The Night Circus  is so visually vivid and creative-- I want to see this luminous and magical book come to life. Much CGI and a great costume artist will be needed.

Drama

The Guernsey Literary And Potato Peel Society, I loved the book, this is a must! I have written about this book before, and have told the reader to get over the title and read it. Set in WWII, the story follows Julia a budding journalist and her letters to the small island of Guernsey. And, I just Googled it, it will be a movie in 2013! Right now Kate Winslet is slated to star (love her!) YEAH! Thanks for listening Hollywood!

Arcadia Falls, I chose this because fairy tale movies are so hot right now, and this has a great back story. Arcadia Falls is a wonderfully woven fairy tale which combines a modern tale and a past mystery with an intertwining changeling story. I’d love to see the cinematography as it flits between the past and present as they start to interlace…this could be eerie and magical!

What books would you like to see on the big screen? Some other books that would translate well to the big screen include:  Physick Book of Deliverance Dane, Sister, The Seville Communion (I hold out hope that Brad Pitt will take the lead role as a priest).

Review: Faith Bass Darling's Last Garage Sale

Faith Bass Darling's Last Garage Sale by Lynda Rutledge

My rating: 4 of 5 stars




As far as the townspeople are concerned, Faith Bass Darling has always had a perfect life. She lives in the largest mansion in town and comes from money, her hair always perfect, her outfits coordinated. However Faith knows that perfection on the outside might mean turmoil on the inside, her life has not been a fairy tale.

Faith Bass Darling, former Southern Belle, has lost her mind. She has determined that God has spoken to her and she must sell all of her family heirlooms in a garage sale today. Gawking locals are buying up her precious Tiffany lamps, for whatever they can afford to pay, often $20 a lamp.
Bobbie knows that Faith must be stopped before she can give all of her belongings away. Bobbie became an antiques dealer in the small town because as a child she dreamed of the Darling Mansion and longed for the precious contents therein. When she sees the antiques strewn across the lawn, her heart lurches and she knows that she must call Faith’s long lost daughter.

The long lost Claudia arrives home, having been gone for twenty years, to find that her mother has aged and that her inheritance is being given away in a yard sale. Claudia really only wants one item, an heirloom ring, she hopes that her mother hasn’t sold it yet. How can she close down this sale and who will assist her against her determined and still formidable mother?

The story follows Faith and the townspeople throughout the day of the garage sale, becoming more about the townspeople than Faith alone. I adored this sweet little novel, and loved Faith as a character. The novel states the question we as readers must ask ourselves, “do our possessions possess us?”

Faith Bass Darling’s Last Garage Sale will make a great light pick for your next book club.




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Review: Maine

Maine by J. Courtney Sullivan

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



Modern, Vivid, Generational Drama

Maine is a modern story that follows a Grandmother, a daughter, a daughter-in-law and a Granddaughter. An incredibly well-written women’s saga with rich and vivid text, Maine would be a good pick for your next book club.

Grandmother Alice was once beautiful and had the world at her doorstep. Alice feels responsible for her sister’s death which occurred over sixty years ago. Alice was always the beautiful one; the only reason she married her husband was because she felt guilty about her sister’s death. Alice felt that she needed to live her sister’s life—to marry and to have children, despite the fact that she didn’t want either. Alice wanted to be an artist. Now in her eighties, still beautiful and defiant, the grumpy Alice decides to leave the family’s multi-million dollar beach house to the local church.

For me Mary Anne is the character one most has empathy with as she is a loving and kind woman, a good mother who has married into the family. Mary Anne feels that Alice is like a mother, and treats her as such, she feels that she treats Alice better than Alice’s own children do. Mary Anne cannot believe how Alice’s own children ignore her and spend no time with her. Having helped Alice improve the beach house and after paying for years of upkeep, Mary Anne fully expects that her family will inherit the beach house.

Kathleen hates her sister in law Mary Anne and since her father’s death has not returned home or spoken to her mother. Kathleen adored her father, who doted on her-- once he was gone, there was no reason for her to go home again. Stubborn Kathleen has dealt with alcoholism and divorce, she also married a man that she didn’t love. She loves her crazy life now, living with her boyfriend, owning a worm farm…an unconventional life far away from her crazy mother.

Maggie is a modern working woman who desperately wants her boyfriend to commit already. And, lucky her, he is going to kick his loser roommate out and let her move in. Maggie and Gabe laugh, they fight, they have fun, they fight. As charming as boyfriend is, how will he react when he learns of her unplanned pregnancy?

Have you read The Three Weismann’s of Westport? Maine very much reminded me of that story only with less empathetic characters. I’ll ask you to read both and decide which book you preferred.




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Historical Fiction, So HOT Right Now

I have been reading quite a bit lately and many popular books right now are Historical Fiction—you cannot escape it! Even author Stephen King has gotten into Historical Fiction bandwagon with his bestseller 11/23/63 about the JFK Assassination. My Book Club’s Historical Fiction Reads include: The Irresistible Henry House, The Glass Room, Loving Frank, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet.  

 Book Club Recommendations:

The Irresistible Henry House

In the 1950’s there were college home economic programs that utilized “practice babies”. These were real babies, who had been given up for adoption and then taken to the school so that college women could learn to “mother” by changing diapers, feeding and caring for a baby. The author supposes what would happen, what could have happened to such a baby as he grew up. With such an interesting premise, this book will make for a most interesting book club discussion.

Loving Frank

A well-researched novel told from the perspective of Frank Lloyd Wright’s mistress, Mamah Borthwick. The author researched the novel for 7 years and even found copies of letters that Mamah wrote, which the author used to create a more authentic voice for Mamah.

The Paris Wife

This story follows Hadley Richardson as she meets and then quickly marries Ernest Hemingway. Soon the newlyweds embark for Paris, meeting and partying with Gertrude Stein and Ella and F Scott Fitzgerald in the Jazz Age Paris. As of today, this popular book ranks #4 for Book Club selections and is near the top of my “to Read” shelf.

Lastly, World War II Historical Fiction is UBER HOT right now (stories set in WWII, not necessarily focusing on the war). Here are some top Historical Fiction choices set in the time period of WWII:

Sarah’s Key, The Postmistress, The Guernsey Literary Potato Peel Society, The Glass Room, The Piano Teacher, The Zookeeper’s Wife, The Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, The Book Thief

*My focus in this article was 20th Century Historical Fiction