Crow Lake by Mary Lawson

Most people's lives run a normal course.  We move through our youth with normal growing pains but nothing too overwhelming.  We walk through adulthood with trials and strains, but generally with little tragedy that is unexpected.  We reach our senior years and reflect back on our lives and for the most part feel a sense of satisfaction and even pride in our achievements.  We know, however, that not every life unfolds without problems.  Some people have tragic stories to tell.  Mary Lawson's, Crow Lake,  is such a tragic tale.  What began as a normal childhood is shattered into near chaos for Kate, the narrator of the novel.  When Kate is 7 years old her parents are killed in a car accident and she and her three sibling's life path is forever altered.  The story of Kate's life is framed by her two brothers and her baby sister but also by her small Canadian farm community.  Kate's trauma colors her every decision.  She clings desperately to her brother, Matt, and bases her life choices on her belief in the grand plan that Matt designed for their lives. Unfortunately, when this "plan" falls apart, Kate pulls away from her family believing that she can never truly connect with them again because they have all been left behind in their small world and she has gone on to earn an education and position in the outside world.  In the end she discovers that her life and her family's lives have actually become "normal" despite the trauma of their early years.  The tragedy of their youth did not in the end destroy them. Life has a way of working out the problems that seem to be insurmountable.  Lawson deftly draws us to the realization that we can make the choice to accept the ups and downs that we encounter, that we can find joy in our circumstances and that we can love the time we have with our loved ones instead of struggling to find answers to questions that will certainly confront us.  It seems in the end, she wants us to choose happiness and let go of what we cannot control.  Good advice for us all!

Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy

Pat Conroy's Prince of Tides, is a love story, but it is not a love story that leaves the reader feeling a "warm chocolate and wine" coziness at the happy ending.  Nothing could be further from the outcome of the characters of this novel.  Narrated by Tom Wingo, a "normal" southern gentleman, we are led slowly through the twisted, painful lives of the three Wingo children.  Raised by an abusive father and a devious, self-absorbed mother, the three Wingos spiral toward their damaged adult lives with little to protect them from their upbringing.  Tom reveals their traumatic lives through alternating scenes that flashback to childhood memories and his sessions with his sister, Savannah's, psychiatrist Dr. Lowenstein.  Readers will be horrified by the grisly rape of Tom, Savannah and their mother by escaped convicts and by the senseless shooting of their brother, Luke, after his pointless attempt to stand up against the government take over of their island home and town.  It is Tom's decision to reveal the "secrets" that have been buried for so long that finally allows him some healing.  It is also this revelation that bonds him to Lowenstein and opens the door to true love and  their affair.  But there is no typical happy ending for this story.  Tom decides he cannot stay with Lowenstein but that he must return to his wife and children in order to create a new narrative for the Wingo family.  He chooses to stay true to his southern roots and the values that he so strongly believes in.  In the end their is some healing for these broken people.  Given all the drama of the storyline, it is amazing that in reality Conroy's writing style is the true star of this book.  He adds so much detail that the reader can virtually smell the salty low-country marshes; we can feel the love/hate relationships held by mother and son; we can understand Tom's need to forego his love for Lowenstein and return to his family.  This was a beautifully written book that sweeps you along in it poetic prose and makes you long for more. 

Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown

It seems when people are at their lowest points, they look for and find a hero to lift their spirits and take their minds off their own hardships.  We seem to be overrun with superheroes currently.  Marvel comics is a growing industry; the world it seems is in dire straights and needs to be rescued, maybe from itself.  Throughout our country's history, we have had many threatening events but the one that still connects to us is the Great Depression of 1929.  Even though we did not live through this time period, our parents and grandparents did and we felt their pain and witnessed their fear in all likelihood.  During this critical time there were many well know heroes especially in sports.  People have long remembered such heroes as those in baseball or boxing and even an Olympic hero, Jesse Owens.  Daniel Brown in his book Boys in the Boat, has revealed the little known story of the eight man rowing team from Washington University who, against all odds, won the gold medal at the 1936 Olympics in German.  These young men clearly embodied the rise of the underdog to vanquish insurmountable foes.  They were never seen as the standard within the rowing community that for the most part was reserved for the elite of the Iv y league schools.  Not only did these eight men beat the beat America had to offer, but they defeated the furor's team which represented the white, pure Arian race of the Germany of WWII.  Brown did a masterful job of integrating the story of the Washington team into a fact filled explanation of German preparation for the 1936 Olympics where their intent was to show Germany as a progressive, modern world leader.  Brown obviously was inspired by the story of this rowing team and as often. happens, in telling this tale, he inspired us with real life heroes to be sure.

The Guest Room by Chris Bohjalian

The world is filled with horrible tragedies, terrifying calamities, even despicable people, but most of us learn of these truths through the long distance range finder of the evening news or social media.  Generally, I respond to the horrors of the world with sadness and despair, but the sad truth is that when the next news story is presented it whisks away my distress and I literally put the sadness out of my mind.  My "life" is unaffected.  In Chris Bohjalian's novel, The Guest Room, the main characters are not able to turn away from their real life crisis.  The storyline centers around a bachelor party that goes dangerously, murderously wrong.  The hired "strippers" arrive with bodyguards and it quickly is apparent that these two girls are willing to do much more than take their clothes off.  The party descends into total debauchery and then, chaos breaks out.  The girls suddenly and startlingly manage to kill both bodyguards, gather the men's wallets and money and leave.  From this point forward, nothing was ever the same for any of these people.  From this point forward, no one who reads this novel will be the same either.  Bohjalian uses the characters Alexandra, one of the strippers, to tell the story of the girls who were kidnapped when they were very young and forced into the sex slave "business".  He uses Richard, the older brother of the bachelor and host of the party, to tell the story of the men at the party and the women (wives, fiancés, daughters) in their lives.  Alexandra's story breaks the hearts of those who read it.  Richard's story angers, terrifies, exasperates, disgusts but generally leaves the reader with more questions than we can answer and more emotional turmoil than can easily be dealt with.  The novel forces us to think about the very real, very painful consequences that these characters must deal with but it also challenges us to think about how we respond to the realities of the world that are completely transparent but that we generally ignore.  I cannot say that I enjoyed this book.  I can say that I have lain awake at night thinking about it.  Perhaps, that is the result that Bohjalian was trying to reach in the end because each of us individually cannot fix the problems of the world, but each of us can recognize that we have a responsibility to speak up and stand up for what is right.

My Name is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout

To describe the main character in Pulitzer prize winner, Elizabeth Strout's novel, My Name is Lucy Barton, as being lonely is a huge understatement.  The narrator and protagonist is possessed by the deep, all encompassing desperation to be loved and to feel connected to the people who fill her life. Lucy wants, even as an adult, to feel that she is accepted and that she is safe.  She has managed to escape her pitiable childhood through sheer force of will and her understanding that education is her only ticket out of abject poverty.  Lucy finds, however, that she cannot escape her deep feeling of isolation brought on by the prejudice she lived with in her small hometown and her ingrained sense of worthlessness promoted by her emotionally stunted mother and emotionally damaged father.  Despite the fact that Lucy has managed to succeed in many ways, she has never been able to develop the emotional bonds she sees in other people.  This novel, though relatively short, opens the door to conversations about the isolation brought on by the shame of poverty, the struggles of post traumatic stress syndrome, the fight against prejudice and ridicule. Perhaps even more heartbreaking is the author's uncovering of the unbearable recognition of the mistakes we all make in our relationships with our children and parents, husbands and wives, even brothers and sisters.  Elizabeth Strout has been described as an author who writes fiction with the "condensed power of poetry."  Her mastery of story telling is clearly on display in her novel My Name is Lucy Barton.

The Crimson Shore by Lincoln Preston and Douglas Childs

Several years ago a wonderfully horrifying movie entitled "The Relic" was released. It was based on a novel by the writing duo of Preston and Childs.  The storyline was twisted and unique and invited a thorough reading of novels by these authors.  Through the years Preston and Child have written many delicious mysteries and a series centered around the character, Aloyius Pendergast.  A modern day Sherlock Holmes, Pendergast is a brilliant yet eccentric sleuth who works as an adjunct agent of the FBI.  The Crimson Shore begins as a seemingly simple theft of a valuable wine collection.  The tale spirals down as a 100 year old murder is discovered when a cript is found behind a fake wall in the wine cellar. The macabre connection to Poe's Cask of Amontillado cannot be missed.  The murder is then connected to a long lost coven of black witches who were said to have escaped from Salem and its witch trials.  Through twists and turns, Pendergast leads us on this mystery ride. If you are looking for a "scary" book, this might be the one for you.

The Japanese Lover by Isabel Allende

Isabel Allende has written a beautiful love story in her novel The Japanese Lover.  This book is not a "typical" love story in that the main character, Alma, is not typical in any way.  Sent to live with an American relative when the Nazis were threatening Poland, Alma became a strong female who was not romantic in her views of people overall.  She was determined to be self sufficient and dependent on no one.  Alma did, however, fall deeply in love with Ichimei Fukuda, the son of the gardener on her uncle's estate.  Theirs was a love that transcended time, social morays and family connections.  This clandestine love affair is nestled into the story of Alma and her grandson, Seth, and his quest for the love of his life, Irina the sweet girl who has suffered an abusive step father.  Irina is afraid to let herself feel strong emotions.  This fear is counterpoised against Alma's fierce love and belief that love will win out.  Allende has created a wonderful tale that opens up the many facets of "love" in any person's life.  We readers are taken on this splendid journey with fingers crossed hoping that all the characters find true happiness and their true soul mate.