Good reads in January

 

January was a good month for reading at my place! Four good books were read and enjoyed! I can envision two of them in my end-of-the-year countdown!

1) the storyteller by Jodi Picoult. This was the second time that I had read this. I chose it because I bought this book for one of my granddaughters for Christmas and we decided to read it at the same time! 

It's a good story. A young girl, Sage, worked at a bakery during the night shift so that she would be alone and not have to interact with customers. She was grieving the loss of her mother and attended a grief support group where she met an elderly gentleman, Josef Weber. Josef began coming to the bakery in the mornings as Sage was getting off work and they struck up a friendship.  One day Josef decided to share a secret about himself that he had not ever shared with anyone else that was about his younger self. The secret left Sage in quite a dilemma, morally and legally. 

The story is told by several different people and it is quite engaging. Good book!

2) As Close To Us As Breathing by Elizabeth Poliner. I will start by saying there were so many characters in this story that I ended up writing them all down because this is the book my book group is reading for February and I needed help keeping them all straight! That being said, this is a good book.

The story takes place in 1948 at a beach house where the Connecticut shoreline was called "Bagel Beach" (because a summer Jewish community came there each year). The story starts off right away with the focus of the book:

"The summer of 1948 my brother Davy was killed in an accident with a man who would have given his own life rather than have it happen."

And so begins the saga of the Leibrilsky family. The story includes the brothers and sisters-in-law of the family, along with the children of all the families. It is the story of that summer in 1948. It is a very interesting story of family and loss and grief.

3) Tom Lake by Ann Patchett. I usually like this author's books, and this is by far my favorite of hers. Many have not cared for the slow pace of the book, but I found it a bit reminiscent of one of my favorite books Gilead (by Marilyn Robinson) in that there is not really a plot per se but instead a slow, but interesting piece of someones' life being shared in story form. 

It is a rather profound book as it tells the story of three daughters learning more about their mother's long-ago relationship with a rather famous actor that occurred one summer at "Tom Lake", a theater company in Michigan. It also was where their mother met their father. Over the time of telling the story, the mother and all three of the daughters slowly examine relationships of their own.

This book will definitely be a contender for my best book of the year!  And it's only January!

4) Weyward by Emilia Hart. Another contender for the top ten of the year! This novel is about 3 generations (not consecutive) of five centuries of Weyward women. Kate's story is in 2019. Altha's story is in 1619, and Violet's story is in 1942.

Kate lived in London in 2019. She had recently escaped from an abusive marriage and went to an old. cottage that she had inherited.  Her great-aunt Violet left the cottage to her when she had recently passed away. Kate barely remembers the one time she had met her when she was younger. Violet had lived in the cottage after her mother's death. Violet had discovered that her mother's last name was Weyward. In 1619, Altha was awaiting trial for murder/witchcraft. She had learned their "magic" from her mother which was based on plants and healing.

It is a story of resilience that had passed through generations. It is a great read!