The Last Installment

 Here is my final instalment of very brief reviews of the many books I have read over the past few months: 

The Librarian of Saint-Malo by Mario Escobar

 

This is yet another book set in German occupied France during World War II. I’m starting to think I need to take a break from these books because they’re all starting to seem a bit the same. In this one a young librarian, Jocelyn, is living in the small town of Saint-Malo. When her new husband is sent to war shortly after their marriage, she makes it her mission to save the valuable books in the Saint-Malo library. The story is told through letters she writes to a famous writer, Marcel Zola, who she hopes will survive the war to tell her story.

 

When the Nazis take over the town, Jocelyn is forced to house an officer, Bauman, who is both demanding and abusive. He is also clearly seeking out sexual favours and when he is rebuffed increases his efforts to find and remove valuable books from the library. Jocelyn also witnesses his particular cruelty to her Jewish neighbours and friends.

 

Jocelyn eventually joins a more organized resistance made up of some of the locals. She is assisted, somewhat surprisingly, by another German officer whose role is to safeguard the cultural heritage of occupied countries. He personally takes on Bauman in defending Jocelyn and the valuable library collection.

 

The narrative carries through to the end of the occupation and we eventually learn the fate of Jocelyn, her husband, the other members of the resistance, the German officers and the library collection.

 

Songs in Ursa Major by Emma Brodie

 

This was a fantastic surprise – I knew almost nothing about this book when I picked it up and I ended up really enjoying it. It tells the story of Jane Quinn who was raised by her grandmother and aunt on an island of the coast of Massachusetts (Bayleen Island) which is clearly intended as a stand in for Martha’s Vineyard.

 

Jane is an amateur singer whose band is called upon to play in the Bayleen Island folk music festival in the summer of 1969 when the headliner, Jesse Reid, gets into a motor vehicle accident on the way to the festival. Jane’s band is a huge success and Jesse’s agent offers to get them a recording contract. Despite facing tremendous sexism in the recording process, the album is made and is a big success. And the band is invited to tour with Jesse’s band.

 

While on tour Jane and Jesse enter into torrid romance (which is said to be loosely based on the relationship between Joni Mitchell and James Taylor). Neither the romance nor Jane’s band manage to survive the pressures of touring and fame. So, Jane and Jesse part ways, and her band breaks up. The novel follows all of the players for years, and against all odds Jane becomes a major solo artist.

 

The book also deals with major issues of sexism in the music industry, drug addiction, mental illness and the power of family secrets to destroy lives. I had a hard time putting it down as I was so interested in the fate of all the players. I found the epilogue particularly satisfying in the way it tied up all the loose ends.

 

The Warsaw Orphan by Kelly Rimmer

 

Another novel set during World War II – this one in Warsaw. Here, Roman is a Jewish boy living in the ghetto with his family. He is at first one of the fortunate ones as he has a job in a factory that feeds him and pays him a small amount to help his family (including a younger brother and a new born sister). Elzbieta is a Polish girl (a few years younger than Roman). Elzbieta has moved to Warsaw with her adopted parents and uncle and is hiding the secrets of her own past.

 

Elzbieta is bored and befriends her neighbour, a nurse, who she eventually learns is smuggling Jewish children out of the ghetto. Without her parents’ knowledge Elzbieta convinces her neighbour to let her help. In this way she meets Roman when his parents are faced with the difficult decision of whether to give up their daughter to save her. Roman and Elzbieta are drawn to each other and become friends.

 

Their friendship is strained when Roman, who is devastated by his parents’ and younger brother’s deportation, joins the resistance. And Elzbieta’s involvement puts her in danger due to the secrets she’s hiding.

 

Rimmer writes well and this is an interesting story (inspired by the real life Polish nurse, Irena Sandler, who smuggled Jewish children out of the Warsaw ghetto), but I just think maybe I need to take a break from this type of book which seems to have been so plentiful lately.

 

The Secret Keeper of Jaipur by Alka Joshi

 

While this can be read as a standalone book, it is really a sequel to Joshi’s earlier novel, The Henna Artist. Those who have read the earlier book will remember Malik, the henna artist Lakshmi’s young assistant. This book takes place several years later when Lakshmi is now married to Dr. Jay Kumar and is directing a healing garden at the hospital in Shimla.

 

Malik, who is now 20, has just finished his private school education and Lakshmi, wanting him to have great opportunities sends him back to Jaipur to work for the Facilities Office of the Jaipur Royal Palace which is building a new, state of the art, cinema. Malik is reluctant to go having just met and fallen for Nimmi, a young widow with two small children.

 

When the cinema collapses and injures and kills many people, the novel turns into a bit of a mystery. Malik does not believe blame is being directed at the right people and he sets out to discover the truth. This quest highlights the huge class distinctions at play in Jaipur.

 

Eventually, the truth about many secrets comes to light. I quiet enjoyed this book, although not as much as the first one.

 

People we Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry

 

This book is billed as a novel version of the movie When Harry Met Sally which is an apt enough description. In this case Poppy and Alex meet during orientation in their freshman year at the University of Chicago. They are vastly different – he is quiet and studious, she is more of a partier – and think they will probably never cross paths again.

 

However, they come from the same town and someone suggests that he should give her a ride home for the summer. Over the course of the drive, despite fighting over music, eating in the car and other such mundane travel-related issues, they develop a friendship. And while they move to different places and embark on very different careers, every summer they meet up for a week long vacation. For both it becomes a highlight of their year.

 

Except, we learn early on that something bad happens on one of the trips and they lose touch. Two years later Poppy is unhappy in her jobs, her relationships and her life in general. When she thinks it over she realizes the last time she was truly happy was on her summer trip. So she decides she needs one last vacation to win back Alex’s friendship.

 

Over chapters which move from the past to the present we learn how the relationship grew, what went wrong on that trip, what has happened since and where Poppy and Alex will end up in the future.

 

I enjoyed the characters in this book. And I thought the structure of how the narrative unfolded worked really well. I recommend this one.

 

Family Reunion by Nancy Thayer

 

I always enjoy Thayer’s annual, light, summery, Nantucket based novels. They are by no means great literature, but they are a great escape.

 

This one tells the story of Eleanor, a widow who is living in an old house on a cliff in Nantucket. Eleanor lives in Nantucket year round and loves the summer when her children and grandchildren visit for an annual reunion. But this year her children have a surprise – they think she should sell the house and move into a retirement community. While they suggest it’s for her health, in fact what they really want is their share of the proceeds.

 

The only one on Eleanor’s side is her 22 year old granddaughter, Ari. Ari wants an escape from her life, including her parents, so comes to spend the summer with her grandmother. She gets a job at a summer camp for local children and pours her heart into it. And, of course, it wouldn’t be a Nancy Thayer book if there weren’t a love interest for both Eleanor and Ari.

 

Pleasantly predictable and easy to read. This is only for you if that’s a genre you appreciate.

 

Anne of Manhattan by Brina Starler

 

This is a modern-day adaptation of Anne of Green Gables, which is set in Manhattan. In this case, after years in foster care, Anne grew up on Long Island with her foster parents, Marilla and Matthew. In Long Island her best friend is Diana and her archrival is Gilbert Blythe. Throughout school Anne and Gil competed and fought over everything – though they did share one unexpected kiss after graduation. After that she ghosted him.

 

Now, Anne is living in Manhattan with Diana and another friend from college. She is working on her post-graduate degree and yearns to be a writer. She is thrown when she runs into Gil, who has just moved to New York after 5 years in California. And to make matters worse he is enrolled in her program and they are paired with the same professor for their thesis.

 

Working together leads to friendship, and then a closer relationship. But then Gil does something that Anne interprets as an attempt to get ahead of her. She feels she should never have trusted him. But he feels the same when he finds out Anne has been hiding the inappropriate advances of their thesis advisor. Together they have to work through the mistrust to see if there’s a future for them.

 

Golden Girl by Elin Hilderbrand

 

While I am always anxious to read Hilderbrand’s new releases, I hesitated over this one when I saw the premise. In this novel, Vivi Howe, a Nantucket based author, is killed in a hit and run accident just as she’s achieved the pinnacle of her career. She enters the afterlife and is given a coach who tells her she has the rest of the summer to watch what’s going on “down below” and that she can use three “nudges” to help things move in the direction she hopes they will. So, a weird premise – but, it actually worked for me and I enjoyed the book. It really just served as a different way to narrate a story about people.

 

Together with Vivi we watch her three children (who are young adults), her ex-husband and his new girlfriend, her most recent boyfriend and the publication of her latest novel. We also get to see the investigation into Vivi’s accident. The novel is loosely based on Vivi’s past and ends up revealing secrets to her children that she had not really intended to share. We also get to see how Vivi chooses to use her nudges and bring about happier endings for the people she loved.

 

I enjoyed revisiting Nantucket with Hilderbrand – many of the more minor characters and locations played a prominent role in her past works. If you like her work, you should read this one despite the somewhat supernatural bent.

 

Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid

 

I enjoyed The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo so much that I was anxious to pick up Reid’s latest novel – and it did not disappoint.

 

In many ways the style of the two books is similar. There are a lot of characters (I sometimes had to search back to be reminded of who someone was) and while most of the narrative takes place in the present, there are many intermingled chapters which tell us about the characters’ pasts. In fact, Mick Riva, the father of the four main characters in this book was also one of Evelyn Hugo’s seven husbands – so that was kind of a fun tie in (though by no means do you need to read both books to understand either).

 

Mick Riva is a rock star who essentially abandons his wife, June, who is now deceased. He travelled around the country collecting girlfriends, wives and probably children. When he leaves June he essentially abandons his four children, Nina (a model), Jay (a pro-surfer), Hudson (a photographer) and Kit (an aspiring pro surfer and the pampered baby of the family). Every year since their mother’s death the children have hosted a huge party that attracts everybody who is anybody in LA. 

 

The narrative goes back and forth telling us about the love story of Mick and June, the birth of the children, June’s death, how the children carried on after her death and then this year’s party. By the end of the party the house is destroyed and we’ve learned a great deal about this family and where the future might lead them. I don’t want to give too much away because this is a really engaging book which I highly recommend.

 

The Paper Palace by Miranda Cowley Heller

 

This is another book that went back in forth in time and told us the history of several friends and family members. The “paper palace” is the name given to a family’s summer compound on Cape Cod and much of the action, both past and present, takes place there.

 

The narrative starts with Elle Bishop, who is a 50 year old wife and mother, having a one night stand with her oldest friend, Jonas. She spends the next 24 hours deciding whether she should stay with her husband, Peter, who she truly loves or leave him for a chance with Jonas. Making the decision leads her to relive the many moments of her past that led to this day.

 

There are many disturbing aspects to the past – both Elle and her mother were sexually abused as children. And, Jonas and Elle shared a terrible secret that tore them apart or they may have had a relationship many years before.

 

I don’t want to give too much away, but I recommend this book for both the mystery of it and the complex and engaging characters. However, I do warn you that the scenes with sexual abuse were quite upsetting.

 

While we were Dating by Jasmine Guillory

 

This is the sixth romance novel by Guillory and it was as entertaining as her others. While the characters in all of the books are inter-related, they can be read as standalone books.

 

In this one, Ben works as an ad agency and lands a big account for a campaign featuring a movie star, Anna. Anna is ambitious and wants to land a big move role but is doing the ad campaign in the interim. Ben and Anna immediately begin flirting with each other and, when Ben gets drawn into Anna’s family emergency, their relationship becomes more involved. In addition to their sexual attraction, they genuinely like each other’s company and begin to share their past secrets with each other.

 

When Anna’s manager suggests a public relationship with Ben would be good for her career, he is willing to play along, even keeping the truth from his family. After this the novel follows the typical narrative arc of trouble in paradise followed by reconciliation.

 

Guillory’s books are always light, fun, well written and entertaining.

 

Seven Days in June by Tia Williams

 

At its heart this book is a romance novel, but the back story to the characters makes it a little more complex.

 

Eva Mercy is a best-selling erotica writer living as a single mother in Brooklyn. She never felt very safe growing up as her mother moved them from place to place as she fell in with different men (most of them bad news). As such, she is working very hard to create a stable environment for her daughter. She does this all despite suffering from debilitating migraines.

 

Shane Hall is an award-winning literary author who has lived a very reclusive life. To everyone’s surprise, especially Eva’s, he shows up at a literary event where she is speaking. Sparks immediately fly between them. And, it becomes obvious to anyone familiar with their work that they have always been writing about each other.

 

What no one knew is that when they were teenagers they spent 7 blissful days together one June – until she woke up out of a drug induced sleep to find Shane missing. He had promised to never leave her so she was devastated and is now afraid to trust him.

 

Despite her concerns they are still very attracted to each other and spend another seven days together – and eventually Eva gets the courage to ask Shane why he left. Seeing again and having the answers causes her to make a big decision about her writing style and leads her to wonder whether they have a future.

 

The Love Child by Rachel Hore 

 

This is a book based on the real life stories of young unwed mothers who were forced to place their babies up for adoption.

 

Alice Copeman becomes pregnant at 19. The father of the baby was a soldier she met working as a field nurse during World War I. Unfortunately, the father did not survive to see the birth of his child and Alice is forced by her step-mother to give the baby away so she does not bring shame upon herself and her family.

 

Hating her stepmother for this, and struggling to move on, she throws herself into her studies and becomes a doctor (against staggering odds for women). She never stops trying to provide advice about family planning to her, mostly impoverished, patients.

 

The baby is adopted by Edith and Philip Burns, and they name her Irene. Shortly after her adoption Edith becomes pregnant and her mother always favours her natural son, especially because Irene is the baby her husband chose not the one at the agency that she preferred. Irene is also bullied by other children (called a bastard) and she therefore knows she’s different but doesn’t really understand why.

 

The narrative follows both Alice and Irene for decades and eventually the two stories intertwine so we get to see what happens when long buried secrets are revealed.