Charlotte Rogan’s second novel contains two parallel stories.  One is the tale of Maggie Rayburn, an Oklahoma wife and mother, who reads in a confidential report which is not intended for her eyes, that toxic material is leaking out from the munitions plant where she works. The leak has the potential to harm humans, including unborn children.  The second story is Penn Sinclair’s, an army captain in Iraq who, as a result of a poor decision on his part, has caused the deaths of two soldiers in his platoon.  To atone, he tries to spread the word about the disastrous effects of warfare.  Maggie and Penn are different in terms of background and education, but they both believe that truth and justice are important.  Both take risks that take them out of their comfort zones, so that they can pursue causes they truly believe in.

A novel about young three men who leave India in hopes of a better life in England and a woman who tries to help is the focus of this hard-to-put-down read that was short-listed for the 2015 Man Booker Prize.  Tochi leaves India for England after he witnesses his family being destroyed, Avtar and Randeep leave hoping to send their destitute families half of their wages, and Narinder agrees to a one year marriage because of guilt and a duty to her religion.  All four of these young people live desperate lives, searching for food, shelter and work while evading the immigration authorities.

It will take a few chapters to fully understand the history and motives of the main characters but stay with it.  The Year of the Runaways is well worth the work.

Desmond’s sociological study of recent evictions in Milwaukee has received much hype and deservedly so.  Evicted is engaging, well-documented and gave me much to think about.  Studying the poor on that city’s north and south side, Desmond shows how easy it is to have a tenant evicted and how eviction can lead to depression, truancy, separation of mothers from their children and many more negative repercussions.  What, for me, made this book so interesting was how Desmond zeroed in on eight individuals and followed them for several years to illustrate what’s wrong with the housing situation for the urban poor in this country.

Noonday completes Pat Barker’s second trilogy.  It takes place, for the most part, in London and begins pre WWI and  concludes in 1940.  It is the best of this trilogy and can easily be read as a stand alone novel.  Elinor Brooke, Paul Tarrant and Kip Neville are artists who have known each other for over three decades.  Paul and Elinor are married.but Kit has always longed for Elinor.  Much of the drama, which includes the twists and turns in their relationship, occurs during the London blitz of 1940.  Elinor and Neville are ambulance drivers and Paul is on the rescue squad.  Barker also has two secondary stories-Bertha, an obese medium and Kenny, a young boy taken into the English countryside for safety, who returns to London so he can be with his mother.

Pat Barker’s descriptions of the blitz are beautiful, precise and haunting.  One can almost taste and feel plaster falling from the walls and ceilings during several of the bombings and hear and feel the broken glass as windows are shattered.  Noonday is a must read for fans of Pat Barker.

First time novelist, Julia Claiborne Johnson, has written a fun, bittersweet story.  Alice Whitely, who works for a New York publishing house, has been asked to travel across the country to Los Angeles to play nanny to nine year old Frank Banning while his mother, Mimi, completes the novel she has promised Alice’s boss.  Frank is a complicated youngster-very intelligent, very sly and very different.  His knowledge of Hollywood trivia is exceptional yet his social skills with peers are pathetic.  How Alice handles this young dynamo, his aloof and secretive mother as well as other characters, is the plot of the novel.

Be Frank with Me is reminiscent of Where’d You Go, Bernadette.  Both have quirky characters who don’t fit in, don’t want to fit in, and thus must struggle to maintain their integrity.

 

 

Like her first novel, Secret Daughter, The Golden Son is an interesting, easy to read novel with well-written characters.  Patel is the eldest son of an Indian family.  He travels from his small village to Dallas to begin his medical residency.  His life in The United States is a learning experience in many ways.  Anil encounters life and death, tradition vs. freedom and entitlement and prejudice.  Interwoven into Anil’s life is the story of Leena, a childhood friend whose parents have arranged a disastrous marriage for her.  Some of the events that occur are fairly predictable, while others are surprising.

The Golden Son is an enjoyable study of a man torn between the customs of his homeland and the freedom he encounters in America.

A bare bones portrayal of a mother-daughter relationship past and present.  Lucy Barton grew up poor in a small town in Illinois.  She went off to college, moved to New York and married a man her family didn’t approve of.  After years of hardly any communication, Lucy’s mother comes to visit her daughter in the hospital where Lucy has been for weeks.  While reminiscing, mom and daughter dig up old memories, some buried for years and painful to think about.  Although Lucy’s childhood was difficult and at times traumatic, as Strout points out, there is usually such a strong mother-daughter bond that nothing can completely sever it.

My Name is Lucy Barton would be a great book for a women’s book club.  I envision long discussions about family, child rearing, marriage and loneliness.

Once again Brooks writes a tale of historical fiction from the distant past.  This time she tells of the adult life of David, the Biblical figure who slayed Goliath an went on to rule the nation of Israel.  Brooks gives us insight into a complex leader as well as into some of his wives, children and nephews.  David was a great warrior who could, at times be warm and loving, and, at other times, be cruel and hard-hearted.  Told through the ears, eyes and voice of Natan, David’s seer, The Secret Chord is a must for fans of Geraldine Brooks.

 

FYI-Since January 3rd, I have been working at The Book Bin in Northbrook, Illinois.  If you’re in the neighborhood, come in and visit. It would be great to chat face to face about the books we’ve read and enjoyed.

The focal point of Clegg’s novel is an accident that kills three people the night before a family wedding.  The plot is explained in alternating chapters narrated by survivors of the explosion.  Ironically, these characters led sad, lonesome lives well before that fateful night.  The wedding was to have taken place on the east coast, but much of what happens after the explosion takes place on the western edge of Washington state.

Did You Ever Have a Family? has been long-listed for several well-known book awards and given accolades galore, but I must confess, it just didn’t grab me.  The aftermath of the kitchen accident did not effect me, partly because the characters were one dimensional.  For that reason, I could never get into their heads or feel their pain.

 

I couldn’t wait to read the final novel in Smiley’s trilogy.  Yes, it was just as good a read as the first two, once again filled with memorable members of the Langdon family.  I cried after I finished Golden Age because the ending was sad and also because it was the last I would read of the Iowan farm family.  The only criticism I have, is that once one begins reading the first book in the trilogy, Some Luck, it’s difficult to stop.