Book Review - One Italian Summer; Rebecca Serle

 

One Italian Summer; Rebecca Serle

Simon & Schuster Audio - 2022)

(narrator - Lauren Graham - not bad)

After a few heavier reads I needed something nice and light and, One Italian Summer seemed to fit the bill.  

Katy, age 30, and her mother Carol had a special closeness. Even when Katy married, Eric it was her mother who she called with any issue she had to deal with.  So when Carol dies after an illness Katy, who had spent the last month caring for her mother, is devastated. She is forced to examine her life and even whether she still wants to be married.  She takes a bold step, leaving her husband Eric at home and, heading to Positano, Italy.  It is the vacation that Katy and her mother were planning to take together.

In Positano, it is overwhelmingly beautiful: the sea, the sunsets,  the slower pace and the kindness of each stranger she meets.  Then something unexpected happens at the Hotel Positano, the receptionist is Carol, Katy's mother at age 30.  It is this awakening in which Katy gets a glimpse at a very different woman from the mother she recently lost.  Watching Carol at 30 makes Katy realize that even mothers aren't perfect and don't always have everything figured out.  

Initially, I thought Katy was immature and self-centered when she told her husband that "her mother was the love of her life," and she wasn't sure she wanted to be married anymore.  I was happy to see Katy developing a new sense of self separate from her mother. I thought the ending was satisfying as well.  Not perfect but, if you are looking for a lighter read that is a bit different this might be a good one to try.

Rating - 4/5 stars

(This audio download was made available to me by the publisher at no cost in exchange for my unbiased review.)

Book Review - Taste: My Life Though Food; Stanley Tucci

 

Taste: My Life Though Food; Stanley Tucci 

2021 - Simon & Schuster Audio

(read by author - excellent)

I initially passed on this book when it was first released in the fall of 2021 but, after reading so many rave reviews, I decided to give it a try on audio. 

What a good memoir, Stanley Tucci has had quite a life.  I never realized just how many movies he has been in and how inspired his was by his Italian American heritage to learn to cook the REAL Italian way.  His cookbooks have been loved by many.  There was one chapter where he talks about the perfect martini which I enjoyed - he also talks about other cocktails and fine wines as well. Tucci has had more than his share of challenges in life, his first wife Kate,  died very young of breast cancer leaving him with three young children to raise.  And, more recently (last 5 years) Tucci faced his own private battle with a painful form of mouth cancer at the base of his tongue leaving a man who loved cooking and food so much, unable to eat for a period of time where he required a feeding tube.  Fortunately, he has recovered and he is back to cooking, creating and enjoying life with his second wife Felicity and the couples two young children as well as Tucci's three older children.

This is a very well written memoir.  It had a nice balance about Tucci's personal life, career and plenty of good food as well.  There are wonderful recipes peppered throughout and, Tucci's  down to earth writing style and plenty of humor really made this book even more personal and enjoyable.  There was one graphic scene Tucci recalled from his childhood that could have been toned down or better-yet eliminated IMO, but, despite that I still liked this an awful lot.  Readers will want a print copy for their shelves.

Rating - 4.5/5 stars

(library download)

First Chapter First Paragraph Tuesday Intros - Talking to the Dead; Helen Dunmore

Welcome to First Chapter/Intros, hosted by Yvonne @ Socrates Book Reviews. Each week readers post the first paragraph (or 2) of a book we are reading or plan to read soon. This one has been sitting on my shelves for over 15 years and, it has the loveliest jacket and the book itself is petite in size.

Talking to the Dead; Helen Dunmore

Little Brown & Company - 1996

Prologue

"THE NEWER GRAVES lie full in the sun, beyond the shadow of the church and yew tree. Two of them are covered in plastic-wrapped flowers and raw earth; these graves won't have stones for a while yet, because they must wait for the earth to settle.

There are a lot of things you need to learn when someone dies, and you have to learn fast, from people who are paid to teach you.  They come up with hushed, serious faces and ask questions.  If you don't say anything right away, they just wait.  It's their job.  There were two of them standing there, noting down the requirements.  One glanced at the other, and they gleamed with satisfaction at phrasing it all so well.  But they were much too professional to smile."

What do you think - read more or pass?

Book Review - Very Cold People; Sarah Manguso

Very Cold People; Sarah Manguso

Hogarth - 2022

Set mostly in the 1980s in the small town of Waitsfield, MA (not a real MA town).  Waitsfield is a town where not much happens these days but, its history and former townspeople date back to the Mayflower. It is a town where the cold of winter feels like it lasts year round.  Ruthie is the only child of an Italian father who works as an accountant and a Jewish stay at home mother. The family struggles financially:  the bill collectors call on a regular basis, the food they eat is mostly unhealthy and whatever is cheap, their home is always freezing cold and the exterior of the house needs a paint job. The mother seems to suffer with severe depression.  Ruthie isn't physically abused but, the scars from her emotionally neglectful parents still do a number on her over the years.

Fortunately for Ruthie, she does have a few friends. Most of her friends come from families with more money but, they do not have better lives. These girls are also to be pitied for very different reasons.

Told from the POV of Ruthie from grade school to adulthood, Ruthie is a character I cared about from the start.  I loved the 1980's coming of age vibe, I only wished I had the power to have made her childhood better.  The writing style was crisp and grabbed me from the start. It was almost like a memoir or a series of journal entries.  We eventually learn the root of Ruthie's mother's depression.  This was not an upbeat story but, it was a well-written one that packs a punch. There are a lot of darker subjects which surfaced in this 192 page book - dysfunctional families, suicide, eating disorders, self-harm and even sexual assault.  Despite the dark tone, I liked this book a lot - for me, dysfunctional families makes for some thought provoking reading.

This is my second book in a row that featured people and families who have difficulty expressing emotions even to the people closest to them.  Fortunately, my (2) current reads: One Italian Summer and Taste: My Life Through Food, Stanley Tucci are more upbeat.

Rating - 4/5 stars

Thanks go to Hogarth and Edelweiss for allowing me access to this download in exchange for my unbiased review.)

Book Review - French Braid; Anne Tyler

 

French Braid; Anne Tyler

Knopf 3/22/2022 and Random House Audio

(9+ hours - narrated by Kimberly Farr (very good)

"Nobody outside a marriage has any real notion of what goes on inside."

It's 1959 and time to meet the all American family - The Garretts  - Mercy and Robin (mother and father) and their (3) children: Alice and Lily are teens and David is the youngest child.   Father, Robin is running the family hardware store in the Baltimore, Maryland area. Robin is sort of removed from the daily life of his children.  The mother, Mercy, tends to the needs of her children but, she is far from a warm and comforting sort of mother. She is unfulfilled with her life, her marriage and, her real passion seems to be her art.  The children: Alice is responsible and the one who likes to follow the rules, Lily is perhaps too boy crazy for her own good and young David seems confused; he longs to be grown up yet still very much a child who needs reassurance. 

As the story begins in 1959, Robin decides that the family should take a vacation. It will be their first and last vacation as a family. We follow the Garrett family from 1959 through the present day.  This is an expansive yet quiet, poignant, reflective kind of story about family.  There are special moments to be shared but, also there is that secret desire to break free from the family. 

I thought the Garrett family felt cold, there was not a lot of emotion but, in reality that is just how some families are.  There was one particular scene on a train involving the grandmother and her granddaughter which will forever be etched in my mind when I think about this book.  In some ways the mother, Mercy reminded me of Delia in Ladder of the Years, a book I finally read a few months ago and loved - she too was an unfulfilled mother needing something more than what her marriage and children provided.

If you are wondering about the significance of the title French Braid it is this - when a hair braid is undone crimps and crinkles remain -- "that's how families work too. You think you're free of them but, you're never really free! The ripples are crimped forever."  Not my favorite Anne Tyler novel but, I'm certainly happy I experienced it. No one writes about family like Anne Tyler, an author who is not afraid to show us human frailties in her flawed characters.

Thanks go to Knopf Publishing and Random House Audio for allowing me access to the eGalley as well as the audio download in exchange for my unbiased review.

Rating - 4.5/5 stars

Book Review - The Paris Apartment; Lucy Foley

 

The Paris Apartment; Lucy Foley

William Morrow - 2022

I haven't had a lot of luck with this author in the past but, I was really looking forward to this one as the setting appealed to me.

The Paris Apartment opens with Jess leaving London hoping to regroup. She has no job and no money and hopes to spend some time with her half-brother Ben in his Paris apartment. Ben doesn't seem overly excited for Jess to visit but, the two have remained somewhat close despite growing up apart after their mother died when they were young.  Jess definitely drew the short end of the stick shuffled between different foster home settings while Ben's adoptive family was wealthy and able to provide him with advantages in life that Jess was not afforded.

When Jess arrives at The Bienvenue, a stately building with tall iron gates, she is unable to connect with Ben as his phone goes unanswered. When she finally does gain access to the building and inside his apartment, something seems amiss.  Ben is no where to be found, his wallet and keys are in his apartment and, most residents of the building are closed-mouthed when she seeks answers.  She has very few clues to go on and, her leads seem to go nowhere.  

What happened to Ben and why aren't those who know him willing to help her?  

Told through multiple POVs, Ben, Jess, the building Concierge, Sophie, Mimi and Nick. All of the residents of the building were odd and rather creepy.  Jess was a great character who had a hard life and wasn't afraid to take chances in getting to the bottom of what happened to her half-brother Ben. The concierge seemed to be hyper vigilant. The building itself had that secret locked room kind of feel with danger lurking close by.  My biggest complaint about this book was how slow moving the story was. There was an awful lot of filler which did little to propel the story. I eventually switched from the audio book to the eBook as I wasn't a fan of the multiple POVs on audio. I felt more satisfied when the story did begin to get more interesting even though certain parts seemed a bit too convenient.  This isn't a bad book but,  it's just one I won't be raving about.

Rating - 3.5/5 stars

First Chapter First Paragraph Tuesday Intros - Very Cold People; Sarah Manguso

Welcome to First Chapter/Intros, hosted by Yvonne @ Socrates Book Reviews. Each week readers post the first paragraph (or 2) of a book we are reading or plan to read soon.

Very Cold People; Sarah Manguso

Hogarth - 2022

1.

My parents didn't belong in Waitsfield, but they moved there anyway.  My mother answered the first knock at the door of the new house, expecting a casserole.  We'd painted the house Evening Fog, she told me, but the woman from across the street wanted to know why we'd painted it purple like Italians.  Some people wore their difference honestly, but my parents were liars, illegitimate Waitsfielders, their off-whiteness discovered only after the paint had dried.  By the time I was born, the house had faded to the color of dirty snow.

This is a relatively short debut novel which seems like it takes place in the 1980's. I already like the young narrator.

What do you think - read more or pass?