Monday Moments - American Fantasy by Emma Straub

 Looking for a summer escape? Ahoy - Board the American Fantasy cruise ship for four days with your favorite nineties era boy band. Three thousand screaming women worshipping middle aged dudes.

Emma Straub writes a good tale with American Fantasy.  Annie is fifty, divorced, and signed on to this trip  with her sister. Alas, the sister can't go, so Annie is shocked at herself for starting to enjoy the hype. 

cover blurb - Call it memory. Call it nostalgia. Call it the chemical reaction of hormones, hope, and sexual reawakening.  By the time, Annie meets one of the band members - not just a celebrity but someone in need of a friend - she has accessed a sense of new possibility.

The story is  told from various viewpoints, Annie, boy band dudes, and the managing director of the whole four days. Her tale is rather exhausting - controlling the guys, herding the fans, and making the  magic happen. 

Emma Staub captures the vibe - the passion, the yearning, the dips into the past, and the reality that exists. 

This is a silly, very fun read.  I confess - back in the  day, I'd buy Tiger Beat: I loved David Cassidy, Bobby Sherman, and more.  I could totally get on board this fantasy trip.  

Finally Friday - Shirley Hazard stories

Shirley Hazard (1931-2016) is a renowned author from back in the day. She won the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and more.  I found her Collected Stories at our library sale for only two dollars.  What a lovely treat!

back blurb - These twenty eight stories are masterworks in telescoping focus, ranging from quotidian struggles between beauty and pragmatism to satirical send-ups of international bureaucracy, from the Italian countryside to suburban CT. Hazard's heroes are high-minded romantics who struggle to accommodate their feelings to the twentieth-century world of office jobs and dreary marriages.

Hazard's writing and characters have an old fashioned touch, but in a good way. Her descriptions of world weary people going  about their day, or dreading a dinner party are spot-on.  Sharp  humor, clever dialogue - her writing propels one to keep turning the page. I laughed out loud at times.  One of my favorite sentences was something to the effect that the "woman looked like a resort town in the rain".  Oh my!  Can't you just picture it - bedraggled, a bit rough. 

This book was a gem on sale. I now need to seek out her novels. Quite the find. 

 

Whatever Wednesday - Anxious People by Frederik Backman

 I like Fredrik Backman's writing. He finds the quirkiness in folks and writes interesting stories. Anxious People was not a favorite. It had its moments and was amusing. But I also found it a tad contrived. 

At an apartment open house, a failed bank robber bursts in and takes eight strangers hostage. Ultimately, each person's story emerges, some coincidences occur, and the poor bank robber is a mess unto himself. 

back blurb: Each person carries a lifetime of grievances, hurts, secrets, and passions that are ready to boil over. As the authorities and the media surround the premises, the reluctant hostages turned allies set in motion an unexpected chain of events. The theme is friendship, forgiveness, and hope - the things that save us, even in the most anxious of times.  

I got this book for $1 at a library sale and I was interested enough to keep turning pages. But then I sorta groaned at a few twists in the tale. I'm going to pass this along - others may love this book.  I don't necessarily need more angst!

Monday Moments - The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler

 From the prologue:

Each of us has a private Austen.   Jocelyn's Austen wrote wonderful novels about love and courtship, but never married.  Bernadette's Austen was a comic genius. Prudie's Austen was somber. Allegra would have shelved Austen in  the horror  section. Sylvia was newly divorced and needed to be distracted. And then there was the man Jocelyn invited to the club - Grigg. None of them knew who  Grigg's Austen was. 

The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler is amusing, especially if you, the reader, enjoy Jane Austen. You'll enjoy the references and discussions. You'll enjoy the real life that is running alongside the six months of book club meetings.  Marriages are tested. Affairs are begun. Feelings are hurt. And then there's love, gosh darn it. 

cover blurb - This is the novel that Jane Austen might have written had she lived in 2014 California. Sublime social comedy. 

I laughed out loud. I enjoyed this very light summer read.  Another $1 library sale and worth every penny. 

Finally Friday - Not Just a Book Club

cover blurb - Margaret Ryan never really meant to start a book club... or a feminist revolution in her buttoned-up suburb.  
 

The Book Club for Troublesome Women by Marie Bostwick is a hoot with strong characters grappling with their roles in the 1960s. 

cover blurb - Cocktails and a discussion of The Feminine Mystique allows the women to see the cracks in the American dream they've been sold. Four very different women share secrets, tears, triumphs, angst, and arguments. This will prove to be the most consequential and freeing year of their lives. Margaret, Charlotte, Bitsy and Viv learn the power of sisterhood during a tumultuous year. 

I enjoyed this book a lot, especially considering where things are in 2026 and what direction things are headed for women.  Steps forward, steps backward. It's fiction, but strikes close to the heart of matters. 

p. 337 Margaret's been invited to a gathering headed by Katharine Graham (Washington Post fame). Mrs. Graham says, "This town is all about connections, Margaret, and there's not a woman in this room who isn't worth knowing. Just remember one thing. A friend can give you a leg up to see what's on  the other side of the wall, but you've got to pull yourself over the top. Understand? 

Yep - wise words to remember.  Good trouble!  

Whatever Wednesday - Gone Before Forgotten

 Gone Before Goodbye unites authors Reese Witherspoon and Harlan Coben in a suspenseful and successful collaboration.  Maggie McCabe, highly skilled and renowned Army combat surgeon, is at a low point. Her medical license is revoked, she's lost her purpose, and takes on a job from a former colleague - an elite plastic surgeon. 

An anonymous client, crazy money, total discretion. What could go wrong?

cover blurb - Maggie does her job in this realm of unspeakable opulence. But when the patient suddenly disappears while still under her care, Maggie must become a fugitive herself - or she will be the next one who is..

gone...before...goodbye. 

Yikes! 

This is a total fun summer pool kind of read. Brain  candy for the summer heat.  Enjoy!

Whatever Wednesday - The Great Divide by Cristina Henriquez

 The Great Divide by Cristina Henriquez is a fictional tale of the Panama Canal.  She did her research and brings this huge feat of engineering alive. 

Francisco is a local fisherman who hates the foreign powers involved. 

His son, Omar, chooses  to work for the canal dig.  Oops -  family drama. 

A  huge contingent of foreign workers arrive - eager for the work, and the money. There's Omar. There's Ada  from Barbados - she needs money for her sister's surgery. 

So many stories.  Henriquez brings this to life through her characters.  

cover blurb: This book explores the intersecting lives of activists, fishmongers, laborers, journalists, neighbors, doctors, and soothsayers.  History carved its course.  Lots to acknowledge in the process. 

A very good read!

Whatever Wednesday - Shut Up and Read

 Shut Up and Read by Jeannine A. Cook is a revelation of a memoir.  Harriet's Bookshop in  Philly opened right before the pandemic. Holy Cow. 

This book talks about the author's literary art salons in Princeton, Paris, New York, and Nairobi

She held book events for Michelle Obama! and so many other fabulous literary celebrities. 

She delivered books on horseback. 

This woman is freaking amazing.  cover blurb - This is a behind the scenes look at one bookseller's quest for creative freedom - part confessional, part call to action, part love letter.  Between book bans, AI, big box competitors, and real life, Cook writes her story. 

I loved this book. This woman is a tour de force.  She is amazing and inspirational. 

And she just loves books.  Truly - just shut up and read!!!!

You're welcome. 

Whatever Wednesday - Epic Saga

 The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny by Kiran Desai is a tour de force of a saga. It is 670 pages - a dense heavy book that takes you to  NYC, Delhi and Goa India, and Mexico.  cover blurb - it is a sweeping tale of two young people navigating the many forces that shape their lives: country, class, race, history, and the complicated bonds that link one generation to the next. A love story, a family saga, and a rich novel of ideas, it was worthy of being shortlisted for the 2025 Booker Prize. 

Grandparents in India try to matchmake Sonia (in Vermont) and Sunny (in NYC). The clumsy meddling only launches a grand adventure as we watch each of them diverge and converge in their lives. The chapters switch tales, countries, and time periods. The various boyfriends, girl friends, parents, and grandparents, along with servants, and friends are richly drawn and add quite the backdrop to Sonia and Sunny's story. 

The writing is impeccable. 

p. 244   Travel stories made a person competitive, even about the places he had already seen, let alone the ones he hadn't.  "Greece? Dour lot. No fun in them since B.C. The only time they become jolly is when they get drunk and throw the plates about. There's nothing to  see but a heap of stone."   It was little blips like this that made me laugh out loud. 

p. 253 Sonia returned to India from America "because it's lonely."   She said, "It's the premise of being American. You are an individual, therefore you are alone. Therefore you must be able to do everything by yourself. Rent a car at an airport, drive yourself cross country to a job in a place you've never heard of, defeat your enemies, trap a rat, make money to pay bills to look after yourself even when you are dying - "       ( IMO - Observations like this are brilliant. )

p. 294  And when was it that Sunny had learned the US was only about one thing? In the morning when he turned on public radio it began: race, race, race.........the conversation came down in a hammer blow - Race!

p. 660  The universe tries everything it can to prevent love. If one thing doesn't work to keep two people apart, then it tries another. Darkness follows darkness, across geographies, across centuries. It has its own life, unspooling.

It has been awhile since I've read a novel like The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny. This is a WOW!  It's not easy, but it's compelling, impressive, intriguing, and so rich in language and story telling. 

Standing ovation.  

Whatever Wednesday - All That Life Can Afford by Emily Everett

 All That Life Can Afford by Emily Everett is a fun read exploring class, privilege, and staying true to yourself. 

Anna grew up reading Jane Austen novels, dreaming of balls versus her own reality as a kid on food stamps. After college, Anna gets to London but it's hard work living paycheck to paycheck. As a tutor for a teenage daughter, she meets the Wilders. Suddenly, she's in Saint Tropez on  a work holiday. Parties, excess, handsome rich young men. It's a whirlwind. One fellow wants to whisk her into his world, another sees her trying to "fake it to make it".  How will she reconcile her reality and her dreams?

This is not a new tale, but Everett imbues Anna's story with humor, grace, and plenty of humble pie. It's easy to like Anna and  also be inwardly shouting,"noooooo",as she  makes mistakes. The book is a page turner with some interesting twists and turns and a satisfying conclusion. 

I give it five stars for fun and descriptions of great scenery. 

Monday Moments - The Last Green Valley by Mark Sullivan

 book blurb - On the Run from One Enemy.  At the Mercy of Another.  

Whew!

The Last Green Valley by Mark Sullivan follows Emil and  Adeline Martel. It's late March 1944. Stalin's pushed into Ukraine.  Do they wait for this intrusion and the chance of being sent to Siberia. Or  do  they follow the wolves - murderous Nazi officers who have pledged to protect "pure blood Germans?

This book is well researched and keeps the pages turning. It's a tough, brutal, complex tale. How to survive?  How to keep hopes of immigrating west alive?  It's hard work to find freedom. 

This story starts in 1944.  I found it very sad in one regard - are we going backward from  progress made after WWII?   Lots to think about. 

Monday Moments - Uptown Girl

 Listen...can you hear Billy Joel's song Uptown Girl?   Sure enough, he wrote it about Christie Brinkley and she starred in the music video. Catchy little tune. 

Well, here's the whole scoop by Christie Brinkley herself in her memoir Uptown Girl. 

She was "discovered" outside a Paris phone booth in 1974.  From there, she launched into a meteoric modeling career and became one of the first supermodels. Modeling, movies (National Lampoon Vacation), sitcoms, Broadway (Chicago).  Christie Brinkley has been in the public eye for over fifty years.  Now she tells her story and extols an unwavering belief in the magic and mystery of life. (cover blurb)

Four tumultuous marriages includes the heartbreaking Billy Joel divorce. They are still friends. 

A near death helicopter crash.  Wow - that's quite a chapter.

This is a fun, interesting, entertaining memoir.  It's a mixed charmed life and harrowing relationships. She comes across as smart, intrigued with life, always up for adventure, and eager to learn. She laughs at herself and does write about her insecurities.  And she agrees she fell  for some bad guys along the way. (not Billy. He had his issues and she had to divorce him. But they stayed good parents to Alexa Ray. I believe her sincerity in those chapters.). 

Plenty of pictures included - damn  gorgeous.  Good memoir. 

Whatever Wednesday - Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong

 Nineteen year old Hai is ready to jump off a bridge.  Grazina, an elderly immigrant widow, calls him down. She's developing dementia. He's full of despair with no options. In  The Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong, these two lost souls forge a path.  

cover blurb Over the course of a year, the unlikely pair develops a life-altering bond, one built on empathy, spiritual reckoning, and heartbreak, with the power to transform Hai's relationship to himself, his  family, and a community on  the brink. 

Love, labor, and loneliness can be the bedrock of  American life. It's hard to live on the fringes. Sometimes a chosen family can save a soul. 

This book can be a tough  read at times. The characters are rather haunting, and Hai often does not  make good choices. I was frustrated with him.  The author, Vuong, has a rich style and good descriptions. 

p. 282  Hai is talking to his cousin  "Touch me. Go ahead. That's it. Everything else, what I do, what I've gone, the goals and promises, they're all, like, ghosts. My ghost is in pieces. It's all over the place, caught in all the spots where I snagged myself. You get it?"

The Emperor of Gladness was interesting. I'm glad I read it, but...it's challenging.

Finally Friday - The Correspondent by Virginia Evans

 Finally Friday.  

Well, many Fridays ago, while in Costa Rica I finally finished reading The Correspondent by Virginia Evans. Amongst friends, this was THE book of  the season.  I was on  the library list forever. And, of course, it was ready for me a day before our trip. Turned out to be a wonderful read. I kept  the pages turning and it helped the four hour  flight time zoom. 

cover blurb - Sybil Van Antwerp has throughout her life used letters to make sense of her world and her place in it.  She writes to her brother, her best friend, to Joan Didion, and to one person to whom she writes often yet never sends the letter. 

As the reader, we learn about Sybil and her life. The ebb and flow offers questions, sometimes  answers, and we slowly see a life story build. The writing has verve, shows strong character, and is delightfully precise with a touch of whimsy. 

This book is a gem - shows the power of finding solace in literature and connection with people. It is about the hubris of youth and the wisdom of old age, and the mistakes and acts of kindness that occur during a lifetime.  (cover blurb)

As a letter writer myself, I truly appreciated the author's skill in navigating Sybil's life via this form of communication. 

The Correspondent is a MUST READ.   Super duper!!!

Whatever Wednesday - The Phoebe Variations by Jane Hamilton

 Browsing new fiction at my local library and this author, Jane Hamilton, jumped out.  Such a good writer. And now her new book, The  Phoebe Variations, proved up to her  standard. 

cover blurb - Seventeen year old Phoebe Hudson was never interested in her birth family. But on the cusp of her high school graduation, her adoptive mother, Greta, insists on a visit to meet her  biological parents and siblings. The encounter is a jolt, a revelation that derails Phoebe. 

Hamilton takes us on Phoebe's journey. She runs away to her  friend Patrick's home - the Asylum. She can blend in with his thirteen siblings. This adolescent rebellion soon spirals into a whirlwind of transformation and self-discovery. 

Phoebe questions everything. Is her friend Luna really looking out  for her? What of Patrick's  brothers? Musical prodigies and they are impressed with Phoebe's piano skills.  As the variations of music calm her, the variations in her life prove to be quite a path of choices. 

I really enjoyed this book. Phoebe is a strong protagonist. She is conflicted at that age and yet growing wiser by the page. The author weaves a musical theme and there are appropriate crescendos.

p. 315  phoebe reflecting back on those days: What I wanted more than anything was for a single composition of his (Bach) to exist past the end of Earth. .... Eventually note by note new creatures would begin to understand that the universal principle, the one true principle for any world, for every world, was inside the music.  

Whatever Wednesday - Zosia Mamet's Essays

 It's  challenging growing up in show business. Zosia Mamet's Essays - Does  This Make Me Funny? is  a mixture of  humorous memoir incidents, bittersweet memories, hilarious observations, and some very truthful slightly sad, frankly scary confessions. 

Father - David  Mamet

Mother - Lindsay Crouse

Quite a formidable background, she grew up backstage at theaters as her mother worked. Zosia calls herself a nepo baby lite. Her big break was as Shoshanna on Girls. 

Her essays vary - navigating body issues, plenty of self loathing, wasted days and nights partying in Hollywood.  She writes of her years as a young adult pining for acceptance and love, her first attempts as an actor, what it means to  be a girl in the  world, and how to define yourself amid  the bustle of show business.  (cover blurb)

Zosia is very, very funny. Her story-telling is impeccable. She writes of a world I can't comprehend, and at times it's as if she steps back and says, "now this is bonkers".  Very self deprecating and quite brave.  I knew her name, but wasn't terribly familiar with her work. I may seek it  out to watch. I think she'd be a fun person at a luncheon, and it seems as if she's  in a good  place now - married, older, more  confident, and healthier.  

Thumbs up on  a quick read. I laughed out loud at times. 

Whatever Wednesday - A Guardian and a Thief

 It's near future Kolkata - flooding and famine. Ma, her two year old daughter, and her elderly father and prepare to leave for Ann Arbor, Michigan.  Her husband is there and she is ready to  start a new life. She has the all important visas in her purse. She is ready for a fresh future. 

They go to sleep, but awaken to find her purse is gone. Dreams evaporated. 

A Guardian and a Thief by Megha Majumdar covers one week and two intertwined stories. The guardian, Ma, frantically searches for the thief. The  thief, a desperate young man commits escalating crimes to care for his family. Food shortages and heat combine to enhance the battle. 

How far will the guardian and thief go to save their families? The author paints a kaleidoscopic portrait of two families, each operating from a place of ferocious love and undefeated hope. It's tough to stave off encroaching catastrophe.  (cover blurb)

This is a stunning book, beautifully written. There is a lot of tension. The author is empathetic to both sides of the tale and draws you in as the reader to an understanding of sorts. 

p. 69  Perhaps it was her mind mixing up a variety of fear, an intruder who  had molested the peace of her house, a crook who had taken what she  most prized. 

p. 177  The husband in Michigan thinking: The pride of having immigrated was also, in  truth, the wound. Didn't they understand that? Didn't they understand that he wanted every opportunity to examine the wound? 

Finally Friday - Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson

 Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson tells a layered tale - it's a story of how inheritance of betrayals, secrets, memories, and even names can shape  relationships and history. It's an extraordinary journey through the life of a family changed forever by the choices of its matriarch. (cover blurb)

Eleanor Bennett has died. Now her grown children, Byron and Benny listen to a taped message she left for them, along with a signature black cake - a Caribbean tradition.  Eleanor's story is surprising. She escaped her island home under suspicion of murder. She's held onto a different identity and tells about herself as a young woman named Covey. 

The siblings have been estranged and now hear about another long lost sister. Will they unite and find her? Or will they stay lost in their own versions of their lives? 

I really enjoyed the journey of the black cake, this history it holds, and how it draws a family together. Wilkerson's debut novel is superb with rich characters and a lot of twists and turns to the family saga. Treat yourself to a slice of good writing. 

Finally Friday - Sisters: Loved and Treasured

 cover blurb - Beacons of support, understanding, and love, sisters  are there for us through it all - childhood, the formative teen years, and adulthood. Journalist, Deborah Roberts curates a collection  of conversations,  meditations, and anecdotes from  her own sisters, celebrity friends, and everyday people. Sisters shape lives and it matters. 

Here's Lori and me.  She's ten years younger, but we are close.  It's amazing. We have sent each other the same Valentine card. We have similar humor and we just share the bond of the Crowther family. We can just say a word or reference and we know what "crazy" we are talking about.  Our middle brother, David, is in the mix, but sisters bond...oh, it's a thing. 

I enjoyed these essays  from Viola  Davis, Octavia Spencer, Jenna and Barbara Bush, Shonda Rhimes, Deborah Roberts, and so many more. I could identify and appreciate every feeling, every nuance, every special sister moment.  

Sisters Loved and Treasured by Deborah Roberts and her interviews was an engaging read.  I do feel sorry for folks without a sister to share all the special  moments of life. 

Whatever Wednesday - An Inside Job by Daniel Silva

 Daniel Silva's An Inside Job continues the brilliant legacy of Gabriel Allon. He's a brilliant art restorer. He's also a lethal warrior.  He has a commission to restore a lost masterpiece of Leonardo Da Vinci. 

But a dead girl is found in the Venetian Lagoon. 

She's a mysterious key to a lost painting, ruthless mobsters, Vatican theft. 

cover blurb - The action moves at breakneck speed from the galleries and auction houses of London to an enclave of unimaginable wealth on the French Riviera - and finally, to a shocking climax in St. Peter's Square where the life of a pope hangs in the balance.   Whew!!! 

Silva knows how to write and his hero, Gabriel Allon, is intriguing.  This is a page turner.

Very entertaining.  Very current. Very on point.   and I say again - Whoa!  and  Whew!