Run and a play

Run by Ann Patchett was the last book that I have read. It was good. Not great, but good. It would probably be a good book club book, as there are a lot of different things actually going on in the book, such as issues with race, mothers, fathers, siblings, loss, grief, etc.

The book tells the story of a New England family whose mother died years before. Bernard Doyle and his wife had one son and then adopted 2 younger boys who were brothers and were black. Bernard was a former mayor of Boston, and the boys were raised in politics and wealth. As an example of the family, one of the boys was named "Teddy" after Ted Kennedy, and the other was called "Tip". Make you think of New England wealth? The father's greatest hope is that one of his boys will be President of the United States.

One snowy, cold evening, Bernard insists that Tip and Teddy meet him on campus for a political lecture. After the program Tip is almost hit by a car, but is saved by a black woman who was also at the lecture with her 11 year old daughter. The woman is badly hurt, and Tip ends up on crutches with an injured ankle. The woman is taken away to the hospital and the daughter has no one to call or go home to, so she goes home with the Doyle family for the night.

As usual, I don't want to go any further into the story so as not to ruin it for any readers. It is a good book and, actually, I have spent some time thinking about it since I finished it, which, as you know, I consider evidence of a good book!

As said, there are a lot of themes going on in this book, which has provoked many thoughts since completing it. There are many definitions of love and family in this book.

On another note, the book read for my book group this month was a play! I had never read a play before, so I found it quite interesting. It was a very good story also! The book is August: Osage County by Tracy Letts. It is a story of a quite damaged family dealing with the death of the father. The family gathers when the father goes missing. The family consists of Violet, the mother, and her 3 daughters, their significant others, a 14 year old granddaughter, and Violet's sister and her family. There is also Johnna, the 26 year old housekeeper that the father had hired shortly before he went missing.

I did enjoy the experience of reading a play, but I sure missed the narrative and development of time, place and characters that you find in a novel! The group had a great discussion about the book and it was quite interesting hearing and sharing the various insights! Would I recommend someone to read it? Yes, I would!