Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons - Lorna Landvik

 

Orginally Reviewed January 29, 2005

Synopsis:
Sometimes life is like a bad waiter—it serves you exactly what you don’t want. The women of Freesia Court have come together at life’s table, fully convinced that there is nothing good coffee, delectable desserts, and a strong shoulder can’t fix. Laughter is the glue that holds them together—the foundation of a book group they call AHEB—Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons—an unofficial “club” that becomes much more. It becomes a lifeline

My Thoughts:
I really enjoyed this book. Each chapter is told from a different point of view, and the characters are wonderful. I do wish that there would have been a little more talk about the books that they picked for their bookclub, but it didn't make me enjoy the book any less. I would compare this book to something like "The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" just because the women in the book are so quirky and they have such a strong friendship. I definitely plan on reading more of Lorna Landvik's work in the future.

Rating: B+

Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult

 

Originally reviewed 6/7/09

Description:

On Peter Houghton's first day of kindergarten, he watched helplessly as an older boy ripped his lunch box out of his hands and threw it out the window. From that day on, his life was a series of humiliations, from having his pants pulled down in the cafeteria, to being called a freak at every turn. But can endless bullying justify murder? As Picoult attempts to answer this question, she shows us all sides of the equation, from the ruthless jock who loses his ability to speak after being shot in the head, to the mother who both blames and pities herself for producing what most would call a monster. Surrounding Peter's story is that of Josie Cormier, a former friend whose acceptance into the popular crowd hangs on a string that makes it impossible for her to reconcile her beliefs with her actions.


My Thoughts:

This is the second book I've read by Picoult, and she is fast becoming one of my favorite authors. The thing I find that I like about Picoult's style is that she makes the reader feel sympathetic to characters who are in situations that would normally not deserve sympathy. In Nineteen Minutes, Peter Houghton is an outcast and has been his entire life. He's picked on and bullies constantly, and ends up taking four guns to school one day and killing 10 people. Picoult has a way of taking you into a character's world so you understand why they do what they do, even if it isn't right.

This story had lots of emotion and hard topics that are tough to deal with. I found it facsinating!

Rating: B+

Child of My Heart by Alice McDermott

 

Originally Reviews 5/12/09

Description: Fifteen is a year of clarity; you're still one of the kids, but you're finally beginning to unlock the mysteries of adult behavior. In her luminous novel Child of My Heart, Alice McDermott's narrator is a 15-year-old girl who has two qualities that give her access to the secret lives of adults: she's beautiful, and she looks after their children. Her beauty has already shaped her life. Her parents have moved the family to the east end of Long Island in hopes of finding her a wealthy husband, or at least a fancy crowd to run with. Here she babysits the children of the rich, whose fathers demonstrate their relative decency by making passes at her, or not. The novel spans a dreamy summer as our heroine spends her days with her various charges at the beach, happily leading her crew on home-grown, rather sweet adventures. Among the kids she looks after is a toddler whose father is a famous, aging artist. Child of My Heart is a pretty straightforward coming-of-age novel, but it's marked throughout by this beautifully honed, wry, knowing tone. McDermott's narrator reminds us that our lost innocence might not have been so innocent after all.


My Thoughts:
I thought the story was nice and well written, and I liked the characters. The plot, I thought, was very anti-climactic, and left so much unsaid. The two major events that happen to the main character both happen with at the very end of the book, and there was no talk afterwards as to what effects they had on the character. Overall it was just an average read, and I was a bit disappointed.

Rating: C