This Is Your Life, Harriet Chance!
This book was such a wonderful read. It's told from a sometimes omniscient narrator, sometimes second person, looking back through the life of Harriet Chance at different ages. This is interspersed with the present life of Harriet Chance. In present day, Harriet Chance discovers that her deceased husband purchased an Alaskan cruise. She intends to go with her best friend, but her friend backs out at the last minute, leaving Harriet with only a letter that she promises will explain. In her place, Harriet's daughter Caroline joins her on the cruise and the two attempt to revive a very embittered relationship. Harriet's story was compelling, sad and happy all at once. The basic gist of this was, what defines us? The person we were? The person we are? The person we hope to be?
Did You Ever Have A Family
The night before her daughter's wedding, June Reid loses it all. Literally, her daughter, her daughter's fiance, her boyfriend and her ex-husband all perish in a fire. This novel is told from multiple point-of-views, so you receive June's story but also others who were connected with the fire or the family--either intimately or just from a distance. At times, the multiple stories became confusing, but in the end, it did come together to create a strong novel. Although the crux of this story is tragic, there is a great deal of redemption and hope within the characters--all of whom are either reeling from grief, guilt, or both. I enjoyed that the event of the fire and how the fire/explosion began was not really the focus of the story, although it was in the story. There was much more of a focus on life and how you could possibly go on.
What are you reading?
4 comments:
Did You Ever Have A Family will be going on my read list. I haven't picked up a single book this week. I've been in scrub down the house mode. The next 3 months are such a busy time for me, I am decluttering and getting all of my holiday ornaments ready to go out.
Decluttering and fall cleaning... there's something I should add to my list!
I read two books this week:
1. Fair Fight: this one was meh. Historical fiction but not at its finest. One too many story lines that detracted from the main one which was boxing (female boxing even) in the 1800s. Interesting but not great.
2. In the Language of Miracles: I loved the storytelling in this book. And the growth that happens, at least for the main narrator, was... well it was like emerging from a chrysalis to keep with the butterfly analogy in the book.
Eerie - I was just talking about the Lottery to my son yesterday...his class just read Charles, by Shirley Jackson, and that brought up the conversation of The Lottery. LOL!
Still not reading much - I've been suffering from a terrible migraine this week, which has prevented me from wanting to do anything that requires a lot of light - such as reading or working on computers. Hoping this passes so I can continue on.
I just finished Born With Teeth for book club and it was actually a pretty great story. I just started My Grandmother Asked Me To Tell You She's Sorry (if you read A Man Called Ove then you'll probably like this one- so far it's absolutely marvelous!)
Steph
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