Looking for the perfect hammock read? Meg Mitchell Moore's The Islanders (#843) may be just the book you're looking for.
Set on Block Island, a ferry's ride away from Rhode Island, we meet three strangers for one pivotal summer. Anthony is a writer with a scandal in his past. Block Island is the perfect place to hide out in a friend's borrowed cottage. Lu, in the summer rental cottage next door, is a stay-at-home mom with two boys and a doctor husband commuting to the mainland to complete his residency. She also has a big secret of her own. Trying to keep her secret from her husband and her prying mother-in-law with her own key to the cottage is a constant struggle for Lu. Joy and her thirteen year old daughter Maggie are the only year round island residents in the mix. Joy owns and operates the island's only whoopie pie café. Just when she's beginning to get her head above water financially, a roving food truck muscles in on her turf during peak tourist season. Not only is the food truck cutting into her bottom line, but the sixteen year old son of the owners is a magnet for Maggie.
Because so much of the novel is about food, how can I resist using the metaphor of an onion as the layers of secrets each of the characters are keeping are slowly peeled away. Anthony, Lu and Joy develop relationships with each other, and confide some secrets, but not others. Everything is seemingly going so well for everyone in the middle of the book that you know that it just can't last...
I thoroughly enjoyed this seaside romance, maybe because so many of the places Ms. Moore mentions here are so familiar, even though I've never been to Block Island myself. But Point Judith? Many fond memories! Boston University? Proud alum. RL Julia in Madison, Connecticut? My sister-in-law introduced me to this outstanding bookstore several years ago. You get the drift.
My one bone to pick with this book also concerns food, though. According to the author, the idea of a whoopie pie café is based on the real life success of Chococoa Baking Company and Café in Newburyport, Massachusetts. Why weren't they in business before I moved south? In my prepublication copy of The Islanders, there is a page left intentionally blank for a whoopie pie recipe. Hopefully it will be published in the copy you read. It's a good thing I have a copy of America's Test Kitchen The Perfect Cookie cookbook with recipes (Updated with no Crisco or trans fats in sight!) for both the traditional chocolate whoopie pie, and the fantastic pumpkin mini whoopie pies with cream cheese filling. Yum! Yes, of course I had to bake them after reading about Joy Bombs! However, one of the characters writes a food blog DinnerByDad (It's fictional; I checked online.) and talks about developing amazing recipes. Where are the recipes from that food blog which had me drooling while I was reading??!! A few of those would have been a brilliant addition to a book that makes you feel like you've spent the summer on Block Island along with the rest of these colorful characters.
Enjoy! What's not to like?
Tuesday, July 30, 2019
Saturday, July 27, 2019
The Summer Country
Lauren Willig, with her latest novel, The Summer Country (#842), has finally written her "...M.M. Kaye meets The Thorn Birds book!" It is, indeed, an epic and entertaining tale, full of secrets.
Set amongst the lavish life styles of the sugar plantation owners and the extreme poverty of their slaves and ex-slaves on the island of Barbados, the cat is set among the pigeons when newcomer Emily Dawson and her cousin Adam Fenty and his wife arrive in Bridgetown in 1854. When Jonathan Fenty, the head of a successful import/export company dies in Bristol, England, he leaves the business to Adam to carry on. What no one expected was his legacy to Emily, the poor relation of the family, but Fenty's favorite granddaughter: the deed to a plantation on the island of Barbados, Perverills. When the English cousins arrive on the island, they are greeted by their grandfather's trusted business partner, London Turner. The expectation is that Emily will sell Peverills immediately. Instead, she chooses to inspect her property before making a decision. The Davenants, owners of the neighboring plantation, Beckles, invite the cousins to stay there, since Peverills turns out to be a burned-out ruin, but Emily senses that there is more at play here than simple hospitality. The answers to what happened at Peverills lie in the past, during a slave uprising in 1816.
The novel alternates between events in 1854, when slavery has been abolished on Barbados and Emily is deciding whether her destiny is on Barbados or back in England, and forty years earlier, a time when the economy depended on slavery in 1812, blighting the lives of both owners and the enslaved. The past is not so far away, after all...
I really enjoyed spending time engrossed in Ms. Willig's story-telling. Does everyone get what they deserve here? Probably not, but it is still satisfying when old wrongs are finally righted. If you ever breathlessly read and hung on The Thorn Birds, or M.M. Kaye's classic The Far Pavilions or Trade Winds, The Summer Country is a worthy successor. Stake out a shady spot to settle in, with a cool drink at hand.
Set amongst the lavish life styles of the sugar plantation owners and the extreme poverty of their slaves and ex-slaves on the island of Barbados, the cat is set among the pigeons when newcomer Emily Dawson and her cousin Adam Fenty and his wife arrive in Bridgetown in 1854. When Jonathan Fenty, the head of a successful import/export company dies in Bristol, England, he leaves the business to Adam to carry on. What no one expected was his legacy to Emily, the poor relation of the family, but Fenty's favorite granddaughter: the deed to a plantation on the island of Barbados, Perverills. When the English cousins arrive on the island, they are greeted by their grandfather's trusted business partner, London Turner. The expectation is that Emily will sell Peverills immediately. Instead, she chooses to inspect her property before making a decision. The Davenants, owners of the neighboring plantation, Beckles, invite the cousins to stay there, since Peverills turns out to be a burned-out ruin, but Emily senses that there is more at play here than simple hospitality. The answers to what happened at Peverills lie in the past, during a slave uprising in 1816.
The novel alternates between events in 1854, when slavery has been abolished on Barbados and Emily is deciding whether her destiny is on Barbados or back in England, and forty years earlier, a time when the economy depended on slavery in 1812, blighting the lives of both owners and the enslaved. The past is not so far away, after all...
I really enjoyed spending time engrossed in Ms. Willig's story-telling. Does everyone get what they deserve here? Probably not, but it is still satisfying when old wrongs are finally righted. If you ever breathlessly read and hung on The Thorn Birds, or M.M. Kaye's classic The Far Pavilions or Trade Winds, The Summer Country is a worthy successor. Stake out a shady spot to settle in, with a cool drink at hand.
Thursday, July 18, 2019
Save Me the Plums
Save Me the Plums (#841) is Ruth Reichl's latest memoir about her time as editor of the now defunct Gourmet magazine. I must confess that I subscribed to the rival publication Bon Appetit, but I do own and love the Gourmet Cookbook which was published under her aegis. It's a fascinating read, and not at all what she (or I!) imagined publishing a cooking/lifestyle magazine would be like.
She first discovered the magazine in an old book shop with her father and became entranced with the writing in a 1940s edition. When it later morphed into a "ladies who do lunch" publication with recipes they could pass along to their cooks, she gave up on it. How many people have that kind of lifestyle? It wasn't until she was brought in as its publisher that things changed and the magazine underwent a renaissance. That is until the recession and e-publishing took their toll. Ruth Reichl was there the day that this iconic magazine ceased publication.
I really savored reading this one. I will be trying at least one of the recipes she included here; if you're hooked on cooking, you're always looking for the next great recipe to try. Here's someone who gets that.
She first discovered the magazine in an old book shop with her father and became entranced with the writing in a 1940s edition. When it later morphed into a "ladies who do lunch" publication with recipes they could pass along to their cooks, she gave up on it. How many people have that kind of lifestyle? It wasn't until she was brought in as its publisher that things changed and the magazine underwent a renaissance. That is until the recession and e-publishing took their toll. Ruth Reichl was there the day that this iconic magazine ceased publication.
I really savored reading this one. I will be trying at least one of the recipes she included here; if you're hooked on cooking, you're always looking for the next great recipe to try. Here's someone who gets that.
Monday, July 15, 2019
The Spies of Shilling Lane
I thoroughly enjoyed reading Jennifer Ryan's latest novel The Spies of Shilling Lane (#840). She also wrote The Chilbury Ladies' Choir (See my post of 12/27/2017.), which I loved and regretted leaving on my "To Read" pile for so long before I got around to it. This is yet another World War II novel, but instead of being grim and earnest as so many of them seem to be, this one was infused with humor and warmth. If you loved the recent Dear Mrs. Bird (See my post of 8/7/2018.), you should definitely add The Spies of Shilling Lane to your reading list.
Mrs. Braithwaite has just been served with divorce papers by her philandering husband. The ladies in her small English village of Ashcombe take this opportunity to push Mrs. Braithwaite out of her position as head of the Women's Volunteer Service League, bossing everyone else around. When her rival threatens to reveal a secret concerning Mrs. Braithwaite's daughter Betty if she won't step down, she knows that the time has come to go to London to tell Betty that secret before some one else from Ashcombe has the chance to spill the beans. The problem is, when she arrives in London, Betty's landlord Mr. Norris informs her that Betty has been missing for several days. Where is she? And why has no one reported her missing? Mrs. Braithwaite bullies the timid Mr. Norris into helping her sort out where Betty could be and lands them both in the middle of a dangerous situation...
It's a treat to watch Mrs. Braithwaite change as she is confronted with the daily dangers Londoners face. There are real spies, indeed! With Betty in mortal danger, Mrs. B. is also forced to examine her own values and what is most important in life. She blooms in the midst of the rubble of bombed out London. I really hated to see this book end, which is the highest compliment I can pay. I can't wait to see what Ms. Ryan writes about next!
Mrs. Braithwaite has just been served with divorce papers by her philandering husband. The ladies in her small English village of Ashcombe take this opportunity to push Mrs. Braithwaite out of her position as head of the Women's Volunteer Service League, bossing everyone else around. When her rival threatens to reveal a secret concerning Mrs. Braithwaite's daughter Betty if she won't step down, she knows that the time has come to go to London to tell Betty that secret before some one else from Ashcombe has the chance to spill the beans. The problem is, when she arrives in London, Betty's landlord Mr. Norris informs her that Betty has been missing for several days. Where is she? And why has no one reported her missing? Mrs. Braithwaite bullies the timid Mr. Norris into helping her sort out where Betty could be and lands them both in the middle of a dangerous situation...
It's a treat to watch Mrs. Braithwaite change as she is confronted with the daily dangers Londoners face. There are real spies, indeed! With Betty in mortal danger, Mrs. B. is also forced to examine her own values and what is most important in life. She blooms in the midst of the rubble of bombed out London. I really hated to see this book end, which is the highest compliment I can pay. I can't wait to see what Ms. Ryan writes about next!
Wednesday, July 10, 2019
Comfort Me With Apples
Comfort Me With Apples (#839) is a Ruth Reichl memoir published in 2001, and it covers part of her life in a Berkeley commune with her first husband Doug, a rising star in the art world, and her early years as restaurant critic for the Los Angeles Times. She certainly has led an unconventional life, with a considerably broader palate than mine. Even if you don't always agree with her tastes or actions, she knows how to grab her reader's attention and not let it go until the final page. As to the recipes she includes with each chapter - not so much.
She includes in this memoir the affairs that led eventually to her divorce from her first husband. Who wouldn't be bowled over by stay in Paris with no expense spared, dining in the finest restaurants and staying at luxurious hotels most of us will only read about? Her second marriage leads to futile attempts to have a child, and when that fails, to a private adoption handled by an expensive Los Angeles attorney who doesn't get it right. Reichl and her husband are forced to give back their child to the biological parents. It takes a long time to recover from that loss, but there is a happy ending here.
If you enjoy reading about, preparing or eating wonderful food, and want to know more about the people who make these fabulous meals possible, this memoir will reward you with many entertaining stories.
She includes in this memoir the affairs that led eventually to her divorce from her first husband. Who wouldn't be bowled over by stay in Paris with no expense spared, dining in the finest restaurants and staying at luxurious hotels most of us will only read about? Her second marriage leads to futile attempts to have a child, and when that fails, to a private adoption handled by an expensive Los Angeles attorney who doesn't get it right. Reichl and her husband are forced to give back their child to the biological parents. It takes a long time to recover from that loss, but there is a happy ending here.
If you enjoy reading about, preparing or eating wonderful food, and want to know more about the people who make these fabulous meals possible, this memoir will reward you with many entertaining stories.
Monday, July 8, 2019
The Trial of Lizzie Borden - A True Story
The Trial of Lizzie Borden - A True Story (#838) by Cara Robertson began its life as a senior thesis when the author was attending Harvard. Now an attorney herself, she has returned to a trial which has always fascinated her - the ax murders of Andrew Borden and his wife Abby in their Fall River home in 1892. Andrew's youngest daughter, Lizzie, was put on trial for the murders. She was acquitted, but no one else was ever arrested in the matter. The question remains, if Lizzie didn't do it, who did?
The trial was a sensation in its day, covered by all the major Boston and New York newspapers as well as the local press. This book is evidence that the furor has never completely died down. Books, movies, songs, opera, ballet and even a musical have been made about the events of that fateful August day. I certainly grew up on the legends of Fall River, devouring every book in my local Massachusetts library.
If you are a fan of true crime literature hoping for a big reveal in this volume, you'll go away disappointed. Lizzie's guilt or innocence is left for the reader to judge. Maybe I've watched one too many crime drama on TV, but I know what my opinion is. There were way too many discrepancies in the testimonies allowed at trial, and evidence and testimony which seemed relevant were disallowed. I think Lizzie did it and got away with murder. Much of the trial proceedings seemed biased in Lizzie Borden's favor as a well-to-do young woman involved in Christian charitable work. Abby Borden's murder was treated as an afterthought, despite Lizzie's known ill will towards her stepmother.
I did find this an interesting read, though In fact, one of my favorite quotes comes from Elizabeth Jordan, a journalist covering the trial for The New York World, commenting on the women spectators, "They bring cruilers [sic] and cookies and other New England food atrocities in their pockets, and actually camp out and lunch on the scene of the battle." I personally am fond of crullers myself, stick-shaped donuts which are especially good with cold apple cider. It does make me wonder what on earth else those ladies could have had concealed in their pockets. They certainly wouldn't have made it through the security check lines in today's courthouses!
Interesting note on the cover art on The Trial of Lizzie Borden: descriptions of Lizzie's appearance at the trial note that she appeared wearing dark clothing, black gloves and a black lace hat with red berries. The cover model gets the apparel details right, but personally, judging from photographs of the real Lizzie Borden, she's much too attractive!
The trial was a sensation in its day, covered by all the major Boston and New York newspapers as well as the local press. This book is evidence that the furor has never completely died down. Books, movies, songs, opera, ballet and even a musical have been made about the events of that fateful August day. I certainly grew up on the legends of Fall River, devouring every book in my local Massachusetts library.
If you are a fan of true crime literature hoping for a big reveal in this volume, you'll go away disappointed. Lizzie's guilt or innocence is left for the reader to judge. Maybe I've watched one too many crime drama on TV, but I know what my opinion is. There were way too many discrepancies in the testimonies allowed at trial, and evidence and testimony which seemed relevant were disallowed. I think Lizzie did it and got away with murder. Much of the trial proceedings seemed biased in Lizzie Borden's favor as a well-to-do young woman involved in Christian charitable work. Abby Borden's murder was treated as an afterthought, despite Lizzie's known ill will towards her stepmother.
I did find this an interesting read, though In fact, one of my favorite quotes comes from Elizabeth Jordan, a journalist covering the trial for The New York World, commenting on the women spectators, "They bring cruilers [sic] and cookies and other New England food atrocities in their pockets, and actually camp out and lunch on the scene of the battle." I personally am fond of crullers myself, stick-shaped donuts which are especially good with cold apple cider. It does make me wonder what on earth else those ladies could have had concealed in their pockets. They certainly wouldn't have made it through the security check lines in today's courthouses!
Interesting note on the cover art on The Trial of Lizzie Borden: descriptions of Lizzie's appearance at the trial note that she appeared wearing dark clothing, black gloves and a black lace hat with red berries. The cover model gets the apparel details right, but personally, judging from photographs of the real Lizzie Borden, she's much too attractive!
Thursday, July 4, 2019
The Secret of the Irish Castle
The Secret of the Irish Castle (#837) by Santa Montefiore is the third and final book in her Irish Deverill Castle series. Don't attempt to read this without at least having read the previous book, The Daughters of Ireland (See my post of 7/4/19.) It would more aptly be named The Secrets... because there are many.
Like the prequel, the action centers around Kitty Deverill Trench, Bridie Doyle (now the Countess of Marcantonio, and owner of Deverill Castle) and Celia Deverill. The plot moves from the 1930s ahead to the 50s following the fortunes of the Deverill clan. Dastardly plots are revealed, hatreds fanned and forgiven, and the reader finds out whether or not the family curse on the Deverills is finally lifted.
Again, I can't believe I spent the time required to read two out of the three volumes of this trilogy. I despised most of the characters by the end for their selfishness, greed and amorality. They are truly an ugly bunch in spirit, if not in body (Of course they are all gorgeous and well-groomed!). It certainly does help things along when one has bottomless pots of money!
JoJo Moyes contributes a cover blurb which reads "Nobody does epic romance like Santa Montefiore." Sorry, but I don't think multiple adulteries with a stone-cold killer or a terrorist (on the part of at least three of the characters!) qualifies as "romance". I found the affairs quite sordid and distasteful, despite the effort to glamorize it as "true love". It's not. Find something more worthwhile to read is my advice.
Like the prequel, the action centers around Kitty Deverill Trench, Bridie Doyle (now the Countess of Marcantonio, and owner of Deverill Castle) and Celia Deverill. The plot moves from the 1930s ahead to the 50s following the fortunes of the Deverill clan. Dastardly plots are revealed, hatreds fanned and forgiven, and the reader finds out whether or not the family curse on the Deverills is finally lifted.
Again, I can't believe I spent the time required to read two out of the three volumes of this trilogy. I despised most of the characters by the end for their selfishness, greed and amorality. They are truly an ugly bunch in spirit, if not in body (Of course they are all gorgeous and well-groomed!). It certainly does help things along when one has bottomless pots of money!
JoJo Moyes contributes a cover blurb which reads "Nobody does epic romance like Santa Montefiore." Sorry, but I don't think multiple adulteries with a stone-cold killer or a terrorist (on the part of at least three of the characters!) qualifies as "romance". I found the affairs quite sordid and distasteful, despite the effort to glamorize it as "true love". It's not. Find something more worthwhile to read is my advice.
The Daughters of Ireland
I stumbled upon The Daughters of Ireland (#836) in my pile of "To Read" books after I picked up Santa Montefiore's The Secret of the Irish Castle (See my post of 7/4/19.) at the library. I realized that it was the third book in a trilogy, so I dug out The Daughters. Since virtually all of the action of the first book, The Girl in the Castle is rehashed here, I see no reason to go back and read more of the same.
In the first twenty-three pages we have murder, infidelity, rape, arson, illegitimate children, terrorism and a haunted Irish castle complete with a curse on the Deverill family. The action in these books swirls around Kitty Deverill, her cousin Celia Deverill, and the castle cook's daughter, Bridie Doyle, in a real potboiler. It's now the 1920s and the War for Independence and The Troubles in Ireland are receding into the past. Not so the aftermath of incidents that took place during those times, the subject of the first book, The Girl in the Castle. The gaiety of the Roaring 20s leads up to the Wall Street Crash in America, where Bridie Doyle is living as a wealthy widow. Fortunes are also lost in London, destroying Celia's life, while back in Ireland, Kitty Deverill and her family lose possession of Deverill Castle. It seems the principal sin in Ballinkelly is being poor.
Honestly, can't anyone in this story keep it in their pants? I can't believe I read all the way through this story, moreover continuing on to The Secret of the Irish Castle!
One thing I do have to comment on, though, is the cover art of this book. From the back photograph of a redheaded woman in mutton-sleeved blouse and full length red skirt billowing as she runs, one would assume that this historical fiction is set in the nineteenth century. What a surprise to find the cover model should have appeared in a cloche and flapper garb! Not a fan of deceptive advertising.
In the first twenty-three pages we have murder, infidelity, rape, arson, illegitimate children, terrorism and a haunted Irish castle complete with a curse on the Deverill family. The action in these books swirls around Kitty Deverill, her cousin Celia Deverill, and the castle cook's daughter, Bridie Doyle, in a real potboiler. It's now the 1920s and the War for Independence and The Troubles in Ireland are receding into the past. Not so the aftermath of incidents that took place during those times, the subject of the first book, The Girl in the Castle. The gaiety of the Roaring 20s leads up to the Wall Street Crash in America, where Bridie Doyle is living as a wealthy widow. Fortunes are also lost in London, destroying Celia's life, while back in Ireland, Kitty Deverill and her family lose possession of Deverill Castle. It seems the principal sin in Ballinkelly is being poor.
Honestly, can't anyone in this story keep it in their pants? I can't believe I read all the way through this story, moreover continuing on to The Secret of the Irish Castle!
One thing I do have to comment on, though, is the cover art of this book. From the back photograph of a redheaded woman in mutton-sleeved blouse and full length red skirt billowing as she runs, one would assume that this historical fiction is set in the nineteenth century. What a surprise to find the cover model should have appeared in a cloche and flapper garb! Not a fan of deceptive advertising.
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