It's been a while since I read a book that I didn't want to put down - and this was finally one. Henna House is a historical fiction about the Jewish community in Yemen. It takes place primarily in the 1920s and 1930s though it ends with the mass immigration of the community to Israel shortly following its founding (Operation Magic Carpet) and there is an epilogue of sorts that tells you what happened to the major characters in later years.
The narrative is from the perspective of Adela Damari. As a young girl her father is ill and her parents seek to find a fiancé for her because, if she is orphaned before she is married, the law permits the government to take her from her mother and place her with a Muslim family. Adela hopes to be engaged to her neighbour, Binyamin, but he is already promised to another girl. She is almost engaged to several others, but bad fates befall them, making it hard to find her a mate. She is saved when her uncle and cousin arrive and she is promised to her cousin, Asaf.
Adela is a free spirit who does not get along with her mother and her many brothers. Though she is greatly loved by her father, her aunt and some of her sisters-in-law. She and Asaf play at being husband and wife until, at about age 10, he and his father again leave town. Her mother gets the marriage promise annulled for abandonment, but that means Adela must find another potential groom. So she is promised as a second wife to a man old enough to be her grandfather.
When she is at her lowest, another cousin, Hani, enters her life. Hani is like the sister she never had - they share secrets and adventures. Hani and her mother also introduce Adela into the mysterious world of henna. For years Adela is happy in the embrace of her new family and manages to evade an early marriage to an old man. But, as predicted, her parents die when she is about 14 and her aunt and uncle must whisk her away to Aden, which at the time is under British rule, to again avoid the Orphan's Law. I don't want to give away too much - though in some ways it is predictable - but in Aden Adela meets up with many from her past including Binyamin and Asaf. And she is betrayed by those closest to her.
In the end the surviving members of Adela's family make the trek to Israel as part of the mass immigration from Yemen. And her independent spirit helps her to forge a new life there.
The book is interesting not just for the story itself, but for the insight it gives into the lives of Yemeni Jews at the time. The author clearly researched the life and the art of henna thoroughly and manages to be educational and very entertaining. I strongly recommend this book and intend to seek out the author's previous work.
Tuesday, December 1, 2015
Saturday, November 28, 2015
The Mathematician's Shiva by Stuart Rojstaczer
Despite the odd sounding name and subject matter, this book was actually quite funny. It's written from the perspective of Sasha, the son of a famous mathematician, Rachaela, who passes away. It is rumoured that she solved a major math problem on her death bed and dozens of mathematicians gather at the shiva to try to find her solution (or recreate it). The interactions between Sasha, his father, uncle, cousin, adoptive sister and the eccentric mathematicians are very humorous.
Interspersed with the description of the shiva, are excerpts from Rachaela's memoirs which tell of her difficult childhood in Siberia then her defection to the USA. We also hear how Sasha and his father were able to escape the Soviet Union several years later and how Rachaela was reunited with her brother who had been separated from the family as an infant and survived World War II by climbing out of a pit where many Jews had been shot.
The novel is written by Sasha years following the death and we also get to see how he really blossomed emotionally following the death of his overbearing mother. Though they were close, she really defined his life and he was able to move on once she was out of the picture.
Not the most fantastic book ever, but an entertaining read.
Interspersed with the description of the shiva, are excerpts from Rachaela's memoirs which tell of her difficult childhood in Siberia then her defection to the USA. We also hear how Sasha and his father were able to escape the Soviet Union several years later and how Rachaela was reunited with her brother who had been separated from the family as an infant and survived World War II by climbing out of a pit where many Jews had been shot.
The novel is written by Sasha years following the death and we also get to see how he really blossomed emotionally following the death of his overbearing mother. Though they were close, she really defined his life and he was able to move on once she was out of the picture.
Not the most fantastic book ever, but an entertaining read.
Monday, November 23, 2015
Us Conductors by Sean Michaels
Although I had been putting it off, I decided to finally read last year's Giller Prize winner because I was invited to see the author speak last weekend. First, let me tell you, if you have an opportunity to see Michaels speak, you should jump on it. He was an extremely entertaining story teller - more interesting in person than his book.
I had been avoiding reading the book at first when I found out it was about the inventor of the theremin because I didn't even know what a theremin was (for some reason I assumed it was some sort of obscure element - I have no idea why since elements aren't really invented). In fact, the theremin is a very early form of electronic instrument which is played by moving your hands through electrical fields that surround it. There was a demonstration of the theremin at the talk - it sounded rather squeaky and awful (more like a special effects machine than a musical instrument). However I understand in the hands of certain masters it can sound quite wonderful.
The book itself is about the inventor, Lev Termen, and his unrequited love of one of these master players, Clara. It is a fictional account interspersed with factual aspects. The narrator, Termen is a Russian scientist who experiments with gadgets, especially vacuum tubes, from a very young age. He happens upon the theremin which brings him notoriety in his own country (even meeting Lenin at one point). The Russian government decides to send him around Europe and eventually to the US to show off and sell his theremin but also to spy for the Soviets.
The book is written as a letter from Termen to Clara when he is on the boat returning to the Soviet Union and in the years following that. But it looks back on his early years in Russia, his time in the US and forward to his return to the Soviet Union. In the US Termen is first given a hero's welcome - he lives at the Plaza Hotel and performs for all of the financial elite. He invents further gadgets (like a security system for Alcatraz) and uses the relationships he builds to obtain information for the Soviet government. He also meets Clara - a violinist many years younger than him who becomes one of the best theremin players of all time. As we only hear Termen's point of view it is hard to tell whether his strong feelings for her are ever reciprocated but it seemed not to me.
With the arrival of the Depression Termen falls on hard financial times - he owes all sorts of money and is unable to sell his inventions. Alcatraz even asks for a return of its advance as they are not happy with his system. He also runs into visa issues and his handlers recommend marriage. When Clara will not marry him, he marries another woman but ends up leaving her in the middle of the night just as he abandoned his first wife (it is a little unclear whether he actually divorced anyone before he married others). When he hits rock bottom, he is "kidnapped" and returns to the Soviet Union. Again because we only have the narrator's perspective it is unclear how unhappy he is about this (he doesn't seem that troubled about leaving his second wife though he clearly pines after Clara).
In the Soviet Union, things only get worse. He becomes entrapped in Stalin's gulag spending time in Siberia then years in a prison for scientists where he is forced to invent gadgets that further the Soviet agenda.
I liked this book but I didn't love it. I have read several first person narrated books lately and I'm growing a bit tired of the rather narrow perspective this affords. Especially after hearing Michaels speak about it, I understand why he chose to tell this story from the perspective of one rather unreliable narrator (Termen was both naive at times and a liar). However, I might have preferred to get a broader view of what was happening in Termen's life. That being said, I still think the book is worth reading.
I had been avoiding reading the book at first when I found out it was about the inventor of the theremin because I didn't even know what a theremin was (for some reason I assumed it was some sort of obscure element - I have no idea why since elements aren't really invented). In fact, the theremin is a very early form of electronic instrument which is played by moving your hands through electrical fields that surround it. There was a demonstration of the theremin at the talk - it sounded rather squeaky and awful (more like a special effects machine than a musical instrument). However I understand in the hands of certain masters it can sound quite wonderful.
The book itself is about the inventor, Lev Termen, and his unrequited love of one of these master players, Clara. It is a fictional account interspersed with factual aspects. The narrator, Termen is a Russian scientist who experiments with gadgets, especially vacuum tubes, from a very young age. He happens upon the theremin which brings him notoriety in his own country (even meeting Lenin at one point). The Russian government decides to send him around Europe and eventually to the US to show off and sell his theremin but also to spy for the Soviets.
The book is written as a letter from Termen to Clara when he is on the boat returning to the Soviet Union and in the years following that. But it looks back on his early years in Russia, his time in the US and forward to his return to the Soviet Union. In the US Termen is first given a hero's welcome - he lives at the Plaza Hotel and performs for all of the financial elite. He invents further gadgets (like a security system for Alcatraz) and uses the relationships he builds to obtain information for the Soviet government. He also meets Clara - a violinist many years younger than him who becomes one of the best theremin players of all time. As we only hear Termen's point of view it is hard to tell whether his strong feelings for her are ever reciprocated but it seemed not to me.
With the arrival of the Depression Termen falls on hard financial times - he owes all sorts of money and is unable to sell his inventions. Alcatraz even asks for a return of its advance as they are not happy with his system. He also runs into visa issues and his handlers recommend marriage. When Clara will not marry him, he marries another woman but ends up leaving her in the middle of the night just as he abandoned his first wife (it is a little unclear whether he actually divorced anyone before he married others). When he hits rock bottom, he is "kidnapped" and returns to the Soviet Union. Again because we only have the narrator's perspective it is unclear how unhappy he is about this (he doesn't seem that troubled about leaving his second wife though he clearly pines after Clara).
In the Soviet Union, things only get worse. He becomes entrapped in Stalin's gulag spending time in Siberia then years in a prison for scientists where he is forced to invent gadgets that further the Soviet agenda.
I liked this book but I didn't love it. I have read several first person narrated books lately and I'm growing a bit tired of the rather narrow perspective this affords. Especially after hearing Michaels speak about it, I understand why he chose to tell this story from the perspective of one rather unreliable narrator (Termen was both naive at times and a liar). However, I might have preferred to get a broader view of what was happening in Termen's life. That being said, I still think the book is worth reading.
Sunday, November 8, 2015
One book I recommend and one I really do not
We are all Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler
I really found this book strange and though I struggled through it because I was sucked in (sort of like watching a traffic accident), in the end I was sorry I bothered. First of all, though a description of the book I saw today tells you the narrator Rosemary's "sister" was a chimpanzee I did not know that until about 1/3 of the way into the book. On the jacket the book is described as Rosemary's "coming of age" story and the impact on it of the disappearance of her sister and brother.
The book is written in the first person from Rosemary's perspective as an adult - and while I did not figure out the secret of her sister, I was confused about her from the start (for example, I could not tell if she was older or younger than Rosemary). When it is finally revealed I think I was supposed to have figured it out - but the author was not good enough to make it clear through hints. When I finally was hit over the head with the sister's nature I understood just how strange everyone in Rosemary's family really was - her father the psychologist who instituted the experiment and as an adult was basically a drunk, her mother who fell into severe depression after her "daughter" was given over to a lab and her brother who left home as a teenager and lived on the run from the FBI for conducting terrorist acts against animal researchers. We also see how the experiment completely screwed up Rosemary's ability to make friends with humans as she had learned to many animal behaviours.
I also did not really understand what role the new crazy friend Rosemary makes as an adult played though she was constantly resurfacing in the present day narrative. And by the end the book was really just a shameless rant about animal welfare. Which is fine if that's what you set out to read, but not really entertaining as a novel.
Overall I really do not recommend this book. There are far better coming of age tales out there and if you want to read about animal welfare, just do that.
The Marriage of Opposites by Alice Hoffman
After reading the above book, it was such a relief to move on to this very entertaining story. This is a historical fiction loosely based on the life of the French Impressionist painter, Camille Pissarro, and his parents. It is particularly focused on his fascinating mother, Rachel.
The story starts in 1807 on the then Dutch island of St. Thomas (now a U.S. Virgin Island). Rachel is born to relatively wealthy merchants on the island. Her father escaped Santo Domingo when there was unrest there, much like his namesake Moses, in a wicker basket carried by a servant. Moses and his wife lost a son and Rachel felt she never received the love she should have from her very proper mother. On the other hand her father doted on her, teaching her skills reserved only for boys at the time. This helped her but also made her too headstrong for her own good at times. Rachel is devoted to their made Adele and her daughter Jestine though her mother does not think she should be friends with black natives of the island. We later learn there is far more behind her mother's feelings toward Adele and Jestine.
When he falls upon hard times, to save his business, Moses arranges for Rachel to wed an older widower, Isaac, and she becomes the mother of his three children. She also enters into a life long friendship with their servant, Rosalie. Rachel gives birth to 6 more children then Isaac dies as a young man. His much younger nephew comes to the island from Paris to take over the business. Frederic becomes the love of Rachel's life though because he is much younger and considered a relative they are shunned for years by the Island's small Jewish community.
Rachel and Frederic have several more children, including Camille. Once Camille is older several of the chapters are written from his perspective rather than Rachel's as he struggles with his desire to become a painter when his parents want him to adopt a more conservative, commercial lifestyle. Then the narrative takes us to Paris where Camille and his parents end up at times.
This is a fascinating look at the struggles between parent and child, between individual and community, rich and poor, master and servant, black and white. It also examines internal struggles, particularly of Rachel and Camille. While I liked Hoffman's The Dovekeepers, this was shorter and more manageable. I really recommend this one.
I really found this book strange and though I struggled through it because I was sucked in (sort of like watching a traffic accident), in the end I was sorry I bothered. First of all, though a description of the book I saw today tells you the narrator Rosemary's "sister" was a chimpanzee I did not know that until about 1/3 of the way into the book. On the jacket the book is described as Rosemary's "coming of age" story and the impact on it of the disappearance of her sister and brother.
The book is written in the first person from Rosemary's perspective as an adult - and while I did not figure out the secret of her sister, I was confused about her from the start (for example, I could not tell if she was older or younger than Rosemary). When it is finally revealed I think I was supposed to have figured it out - but the author was not good enough to make it clear through hints. When I finally was hit over the head with the sister's nature I understood just how strange everyone in Rosemary's family really was - her father the psychologist who instituted the experiment and as an adult was basically a drunk, her mother who fell into severe depression after her "daughter" was given over to a lab and her brother who left home as a teenager and lived on the run from the FBI for conducting terrorist acts against animal researchers. We also see how the experiment completely screwed up Rosemary's ability to make friends with humans as she had learned to many animal behaviours.
I also did not really understand what role the new crazy friend Rosemary makes as an adult played though she was constantly resurfacing in the present day narrative. And by the end the book was really just a shameless rant about animal welfare. Which is fine if that's what you set out to read, but not really entertaining as a novel.
Overall I really do not recommend this book. There are far better coming of age tales out there and if you want to read about animal welfare, just do that.
The Marriage of Opposites by Alice Hoffman
After reading the above book, it was such a relief to move on to this very entertaining story. This is a historical fiction loosely based on the life of the French Impressionist painter, Camille Pissarro, and his parents. It is particularly focused on his fascinating mother, Rachel.
The story starts in 1807 on the then Dutch island of St. Thomas (now a U.S. Virgin Island). Rachel is born to relatively wealthy merchants on the island. Her father escaped Santo Domingo when there was unrest there, much like his namesake Moses, in a wicker basket carried by a servant. Moses and his wife lost a son and Rachel felt she never received the love she should have from her very proper mother. On the other hand her father doted on her, teaching her skills reserved only for boys at the time. This helped her but also made her too headstrong for her own good at times. Rachel is devoted to their made Adele and her daughter Jestine though her mother does not think she should be friends with black natives of the island. We later learn there is far more behind her mother's feelings toward Adele and Jestine.
When he falls upon hard times, to save his business, Moses arranges for Rachel to wed an older widower, Isaac, and she becomes the mother of his three children. She also enters into a life long friendship with their servant, Rosalie. Rachel gives birth to 6 more children then Isaac dies as a young man. His much younger nephew comes to the island from Paris to take over the business. Frederic becomes the love of Rachel's life though because he is much younger and considered a relative they are shunned for years by the Island's small Jewish community.
Rachel and Frederic have several more children, including Camille. Once Camille is older several of the chapters are written from his perspective rather than Rachel's as he struggles with his desire to become a painter when his parents want him to adopt a more conservative, commercial lifestyle. Then the narrative takes us to Paris where Camille and his parents end up at times.
This is a fascinating look at the struggles between parent and child, between individual and community, rich and poor, master and servant, black and white. It also examines internal struggles, particularly of Rachel and Camille. While I liked Hoffman's The Dovekeepers, this was shorter and more manageable. I really recommend this one.
Monday, October 19, 2015
My Sunshine Away by M.O. Walsh
First of all, I love the title. Taken from the song "You are my Sunshine", this book clearly looks at how "taking someone's sunshine away" can transform not only that person but everyone around.
The story takes place in Baton Rouge in the late 1980s and early 1990's when the narrator, who is telling his story many years later, is a young teenager. As young boys will, he worships Lindy, the girl who lives across the street to the point of stalking her. All of this seems like an innocent crush until the day in 1989 when is raped and her parents and the police come knocking on the door and identify the narrator as one of the suspects. Given he does not even really know what the word rape means at the time everyone loses interest in him as a suspect until his mother finds a box of the memorabilia about Lindy that he has stashed under his bed. Though she doesn't share the information with anyone other than his father, the fact that his mother could suspect him weighs on him.
The narrator makes another bad mistake - he tells everyone at school what happened to Lindy over the summer and she stops talking to him for a year. He spends the year changing his identity based on what he thinks she will like and thus losing many of his friends and prior interests.
The story also explores the other suspects in the crime - a 20 year old neighbour who has been up to no good since finishing high school, the adopted son of some truly creepy neighbours who doesn't seem to have any friends, and the most disturbing of all, this boy's adoptive father who is apparently a psychiatrist, but spends most of his time stalking a stray dog, taking pornographic pictures of his neighbours and abusing his wife, son and a string of foster children that come in and out of his house.
While the main storyline is this rape and the impact it has on the whole neighbourhood, the book also deals with the narrator's reaction to his parents' divorce, another tragedy that hits his family and his experimentation with girls, alcohol and drugs. There are also some interesting asides about life in Baton Rouge (especially how the heat affects it), and the impact of Hurricane Katrina, which directly hit only New Orleans, on that community.
By the end the mystery of the rape is solved by him (though apparently not the police) and we see how his life has turned out. We also see that Lindy eventually manages to move on though is obviously forever changed.
The story takes place in Baton Rouge in the late 1980s and early 1990's when the narrator, who is telling his story many years later, is a young teenager. As young boys will, he worships Lindy, the girl who lives across the street to the point of stalking her. All of this seems like an innocent crush until the day in 1989 when is raped and her parents and the police come knocking on the door and identify the narrator as one of the suspects. Given he does not even really know what the word rape means at the time everyone loses interest in him as a suspect until his mother finds a box of the memorabilia about Lindy that he has stashed under his bed. Though she doesn't share the information with anyone other than his father, the fact that his mother could suspect him weighs on him.
The narrator makes another bad mistake - he tells everyone at school what happened to Lindy over the summer and she stops talking to him for a year. He spends the year changing his identity based on what he thinks she will like and thus losing many of his friends and prior interests.
The story also explores the other suspects in the crime - a 20 year old neighbour who has been up to no good since finishing high school, the adopted son of some truly creepy neighbours who doesn't seem to have any friends, and the most disturbing of all, this boy's adoptive father who is apparently a psychiatrist, but spends most of his time stalking a stray dog, taking pornographic pictures of his neighbours and abusing his wife, son and a string of foster children that come in and out of his house.
While the main storyline is this rape and the impact it has on the whole neighbourhood, the book also deals with the narrator's reaction to his parents' divorce, another tragedy that hits his family and his experimentation with girls, alcohol and drugs. There are also some interesting asides about life in Baton Rouge (especially how the heat affects it), and the impact of Hurricane Katrina, which directly hit only New Orleans, on that community.
By the end the mystery of the rape is solved by him (though apparently not the police) and we see how his life has turned out. We also see that Lindy eventually manages to move on though is obviously forever changed.
Wednesday, October 14, 2015
The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom
This book was very sad in parts, but I still enjoyed the very realistic story of the lives of an indentured servant and the slaves on a Virginia tobacco plantation at the turn of the nineteenth century.
Seven year old Lavinia is orphaned aboard the ship her family travels on to escape Ireland for the United States. Torn away from her brother, she is taken on as a servant by the captain of the ship who gives her to his illegitimate slave daughter to train. Completely traumatized at first, Lavinia does not speak and is unable to hold down food but is slowly nursed to health by the house slaves who she eventually adopts as her Mama, Papa and siblings. While young and naive, her relationship with the slaves is easy and familial. But as she ages she begins to see how she must sit separately from them in Church and witnesses their abuse at the hands of a cruel manager and the captain's son.
When the captain dies, his wife who is already addicted to opium, descends into madness and is taken to Williamsburg with her sister and brother-in-law. Because she is attached to Lavinia, she accompanies them, befriends their daughter Meg and is taught lessons, both academic and how to act as a "white lady". All the time she pines for her black family. At age 20 she finally returns to the plantation - but in a different capacity, as the lady of the "big house". Her husband forces her to keep her distance from her black family, but when she is shattered by secrets about her husband, they prove their loyalty to her. And Lavinia must decide where her loyalties lie.
I do not want to give the ending away, because this is a really well written, enjoyable book and I recommend you read it on your own. There are some fabulous characters - particularly Mama and Papa, Belle, Meg and Lavinia herself. For the most part the white men are not as sympathetic though Will Stephens is the exception.
Seven year old Lavinia is orphaned aboard the ship her family travels on to escape Ireland for the United States. Torn away from her brother, she is taken on as a servant by the captain of the ship who gives her to his illegitimate slave daughter to train. Completely traumatized at first, Lavinia does not speak and is unable to hold down food but is slowly nursed to health by the house slaves who she eventually adopts as her Mama, Papa and siblings. While young and naive, her relationship with the slaves is easy and familial. But as she ages she begins to see how she must sit separately from them in Church and witnesses their abuse at the hands of a cruel manager and the captain's son.
When the captain dies, his wife who is already addicted to opium, descends into madness and is taken to Williamsburg with her sister and brother-in-law. Because she is attached to Lavinia, she accompanies them, befriends their daughter Meg and is taught lessons, both academic and how to act as a "white lady". All the time she pines for her black family. At age 20 she finally returns to the plantation - but in a different capacity, as the lady of the "big house". Her husband forces her to keep her distance from her black family, but when she is shattered by secrets about her husband, they prove their loyalty to her. And Lavinia must decide where her loyalties lie.
I do not want to give the ending away, because this is a really well written, enjoyable book and I recommend you read it on your own. There are some fabulous characters - particularly Mama and Papa, Belle, Meg and Lavinia herself. For the most part the white men are not as sympathetic though Will Stephens is the exception.
Monday, September 28, 2015
This is Happy by Camilla Gibb
For a while there I thought I'd lost interest in reading, but I think I just hadn't happened upon the right book - because I raced through this one in a couple of days.
The book is a memoir by Canadian author, Camilla Gibb. I had read one of her novels years ago (Sweetness in the Belly) and now that I have seen her struggles up close I would like to read more.
Gibb was born to English parents who emigrated to Canada when she and her brother we small children. Her father suffered from mental illness and alcoholism which led to the breakdown of the marriage and a generally unhappy childhood for Gibb. She did describe two happy years when her mother had a younger partner, Ara, an Armenian actor. This relationship breaks up for reasons that are never disclosed to Gibb (despite her attempts at finding out from both of them when she is an adult). Though life was difficult for Gibb, it was worse for her brother who was sent to live with his father in dire conditions for a lengthy period - he eventually escapes to drugs which creates a life long addiction problem.
Gibb is also unlucky in love - left by several men at a young age or just meeting the wrong guy at the wrong time. She studies anthropology at Oxford and the stress and isolation there lead to her own mental illness diagnosis. As part of her field studies she spends time living with a traditional family in Ethiopia and there she does fine without any anti-depressants but struggles again when back at Oxford so finally returns to Canada. As an aside, her descriptions of life in the women's section of a family home in a small village in Ethiopia were fascinating - and obviously provided significant content for Sweetness in the Belly).
She is helped in her writing career by a stranger she meets in a park who gives her $6000 with no strings attached so she can leave her more stable career and begin to write. I thought this was an interesting piece fortune for a woman who so frequently met with misfortune.
The meat of Gibb's story is her almost 10 year marriage to Anna which ends when Gibb is pregnant with a daughter they decided to conceive together. This also leads Gibb to the depths of despair though she abandons thoughts of suicide for the baby she carries. We then see how, once the baby is born, she rebuilds her family. She develops a better relationship with her mother (who she now understands better as a single mother herself) and step-father, an on again off again relationship with her brother and a family she makes on her own with a woman who begins as her nanny but who, together with her husband and eventual baby, become more like family and other friends she meets along the way. It is with this group that she finally comes to the title realization that "this is happy".
The book is a memoir by Canadian author, Camilla Gibb. I had read one of her novels years ago (Sweetness in the Belly) and now that I have seen her struggles up close I would like to read more.
Gibb was born to English parents who emigrated to Canada when she and her brother we small children. Her father suffered from mental illness and alcoholism which led to the breakdown of the marriage and a generally unhappy childhood for Gibb. She did describe two happy years when her mother had a younger partner, Ara, an Armenian actor. This relationship breaks up for reasons that are never disclosed to Gibb (despite her attempts at finding out from both of them when she is an adult). Though life was difficult for Gibb, it was worse for her brother who was sent to live with his father in dire conditions for a lengthy period - he eventually escapes to drugs which creates a life long addiction problem.
Gibb is also unlucky in love - left by several men at a young age or just meeting the wrong guy at the wrong time. She studies anthropology at Oxford and the stress and isolation there lead to her own mental illness diagnosis. As part of her field studies she spends time living with a traditional family in Ethiopia and there she does fine without any anti-depressants but struggles again when back at Oxford so finally returns to Canada. As an aside, her descriptions of life in the women's section of a family home in a small village in Ethiopia were fascinating - and obviously provided significant content for Sweetness in the Belly).
She is helped in her writing career by a stranger she meets in a park who gives her $6000 with no strings attached so she can leave her more stable career and begin to write. I thought this was an interesting piece fortune for a woman who so frequently met with misfortune.
The meat of Gibb's story is her almost 10 year marriage to Anna which ends when Gibb is pregnant with a daughter they decided to conceive together. This also leads Gibb to the depths of despair though she abandons thoughts of suicide for the baby she carries. We then see how, once the baby is born, she rebuilds her family. She develops a better relationship with her mother (who she now understands better as a single mother herself) and step-father, an on again off again relationship with her brother and a family she makes on her own with a woman who begins as her nanny but who, together with her husband and eventual baby, become more like family and other friends she meets along the way. It is with this group that she finally comes to the title realization that "this is happy".
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