May 30, 2024

The Book I Loved: Leaving by Roxana Robinson

Love found. Love lost. Love found again. Love –well, that would be a spoiler wouldn’t it?

Sarah and Warren meet and fall in love in college and move towards getting married, but when Warren proposes embarking on what Sarah considers a dangerous and unwise trip, she has second thoughts about who he is. They go their separate ways and marry other people. Decades later they recognize each other at an opera and soon begin an affair. Sarah is divorced and Warren’s marriage, he realizes, is unfulfilling. As Warren begins divorce proceedings, he faces not only deep distress from his wife, but also the wrath of his daughter who threatens to cut him out of her life completely. Both Sarah and Warren confront the moral responsibilities of their love for and history with their families and each other.

This book is an example of much of what I love in a book: complex, but believable characters. Characters who struggle to learn about themselves and one another and grow. The ending doesn’t need to be happily ever after, but it must make sense. Along with being well-written–a must–I want to learn something about myself on the pages. In this case I thought about all the different lives possible within us with just a slight change of direction or a different decision.

And this book is not just well-written, but beautifully written. One example is early in the book as Sarah and Warren become reacquainted:

“I wanted to hear about your life,” she says. ” You go along from year to year and you think you’re part of the lives of everyone you’ve known. You sort of feel you own them, even if you don’t see them, because they live inside your mind. Then you’re sixty, and you realize the people you knew have been leading their lives apart from yours. Remember in To The Lighthouse, when someone tells Mrs. Ramsay about friends she hasn’t seen in years? They’ve built a conservatory. Mrs. Ramsay remembers the time they went on the river together, and she was so cold. She can’t believe that they’re the sort of people who would build a conservatory. She’s shocked to realize that they have been carrying on their lives without her.” She smiles at him. “I wanted to know what happened to you. If you’d built a conservatory.” p. 42

It doesn’t hurt that they are the kind of people who read and loved Virginia Woolf, but more than that I love the intelligent and sensitive and deep conversations and interactions. I must say, however, I found both Sarah’s and Warren’s adult children annoying and not as well drawn.

Robinson has written other novels and short stories and a biography of Georgia O’Keefe, which I think I may have read. More for the TBR?

The Book I Appreciated: Trust by Hernan Diaz

What stands out for me in this book is the intriguing construction.

The book is divided into four sections, beginning with a novel within the novel: Bonds about 1930’s Wall Street tycoon Benjamin Rask and his wife Helen. The next section, My Life, is notes for another book, similar to Bonds. Andrew Bevel narrates his life in finance and his philanthropic wife Mildred. The reader wonders, “What is going on here?” The third section introduces Ida Partenza, the daughter of an Italian immigrant who is hired by Bevel as his secretary and ghostwriter. Bevel’s intention is to refute the version told of his life in Bonds. He wants to set the record straight. And the 4th section, well, it’s Bevel’s wife’s Mildred turn to share her version. Huh? Really?

I supposed I should not have been surprised that a book titled Trust invites the reader to question everything. What is fact? What is fiction? Whom and what should I trust?

Trust is a 2023 Pulitzer Prize winner, along with Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver–a book I loved. I admire Trust as a mastery of manipulation and I, like many reviewers thought about Edith Wharton and Henry James as I read this book. And also The Great Gatsby and even the song about money from the musical Cabaret. I am glad I read it and I encourage you to read it, too, but it felt more like an intellectual exercise than a companion.

Additions to My TBR

I just learned, thanks to Anne Bogel’s Summer Reading Guide https://members.modernmrsdarcy.com/product/2024-summer-reading-guide/ that French author Valerie Perrin’s first novel, Forgotten Sunday, will be released here in June. Her book Fresh Water for Flowers is one of my all-time favorite novels, and I will set aside anything I am reading for this work by her.

Thanks to Anne, I have added a number of other books to my TBR:

• Real Americans by Rachel Khong
• Sandwich by Catherine Newman
• You Are Here by David Nicholls
• All the Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker
• How To Read A Book by Monica Wood
• Shopkeeping: Stories, Advice and Observations by Peter Miller

Both Parnassus Books (Ann Patchett’s book store in Nashville) and Arcadia Books, Spring Green, WI have forced me to add these books to my TBR.

• The Rachel Incident by Emma O” Donoghue (now in paperback)
• Safekeep by Yale van den Wooden
• Housemates by Emma Copley Eisenberg

Next Thursday, June 6, I will post the summary of my May reading and also my intentions for summer reading. Stay tuned and happy reading!

An Invitation

Have you added anything to your TBR recently? I would love to know.