Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake; Anna Quindlen

Title: Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake

Author:  Anna Quindlen

Publication Year: April 24, 2012

Publisher: Random House

Edition:eGalley

Source: Publisher/Edelweiss

Date Completed: 3/30/2012

Rating: 5/5

Recommend: yes

Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake, is a wonderful memoir about the author, Anna Quindlen's life.  Written as a series of short essays, it's just over 180 pages, but full of so much wisdom which comes from life experience. 

The author reflects on her childhood, young adulthood, the middle years as a working parent of three, and her life now, as she approached her 60th birthday.  Quindlen, claims to still feel like 40," even though the body might have shifted a bit."   She covers such topics as marriage, advice for young people about the the things that really matter the most in life, raising children, careers, aging parents, being raised Catholic, and faith in general.  Her observations about the lives of women in the 50-60 year-old age group, are dead-on-accurate.

Being born in the same year as Quindlen, so much of what she had to say about her life resonated with me as well. For example, 

• "We were the first generation of women who are intimately involved in the lives of our children and in the lives of our parents while trying to hold down jobs outside the home at the same time. Someone even came up with a name for this: the sandwich generation...."
• "When I was young I was loath to admit that I liked being alone, but not anymore.  By the time you've lived for fifty or sixty years, you are better armored to embrace the things about yourself that are true, even if the you think the world sees them as odd, eccentric....."
• "What a time we've live through so revolutionary that the list could go on and on: the Pill, the heart transplant, the moon landings, cell phones, cable television, computer communication,.....and  as Quindlen's father said..."I'm glad I lived long enough to see the Phillies win a World Series and a black man elected President."  [ for me, it's seeing the Boston Red Sox win 2 World Series]
• "I am a liberal because......as I said often, much to the consternation of friends of other faiths who have come to see Catholicism as narrow, conservative, and antediluvian, I am a liberal because I was raised Catholic.  In a typically thoughtful and searching speech he gave at Notre Dame, former New York Governor Mario Cuomo, the most intellectual of non-clerical Catholics referred to practicing the work of Christ in our life, 'I practice it especially where the love is most needed, among the poor and weak and the dispossessed.' That's the lesson I took away from the New Testament, the requirement that if you had two cloaks you should give one to the person who had none that you love your neighbor as yourself. It's a lesson that never left me."

For such a short book, I spent an entire week reading, rereading and reflecting on what the author wrote.  Her story made me appreciate, so much more, being born in a decade that was followed by so many positive changes and choices, especially for women.

This book would make a perfect birthday or Mother's Day gift for the "baby boomer" woman in your life.  In my opinion, this is the targeted age group that will enjoy this book the most. 

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED - LOVED IT!