Archive for the ‘relationships’ Tag
Set in 1960s in a northern Virginia suburb of Washington, D.C., Marie Bostwick’s novel, The Book Club for Troublesome Women is a misnomer– at least by today’s standards.
The housing development where the women live is new, so none of the neighbors know one another well. After visiting the local bookstore, Margaret Ryan decides to form a book club. She invites three other women to discuss Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique, which has just hit the shelves. The group calls itself The Bettys.
Bostwick ascribes interesting attributes to each woman. Marilyn, Viv and Charlotte are all married with children. Charlotte is brash and creative unlike anyone Marilyn has ever met. Bitsy, the youngest and married to a much older man, is desperate to get pregnant.
The novel focuses on the personalities and friendships, which are initially in line with the times in which they live. This is primarily focused on the sexism they face in their marriages and outside their homes. Slowly, and predictably, as the women grow closer they begin to change by challenging the norms of the day.
There’s plenty of humor and nostalgia, even for those who weren’t part of that era. The women’s frustrations at not being taken seriously are palpable, but so is their joy when they are.
The final chapter takes readers to the early 2000s. As for the title, these women aren’t troublesome; rather they’re brave, progressive and evolve to become defiant. There’s little that’s unexpected, but it’s a fun read nonetheless.
The Book Club for Troublesome Women
Almost four bookmarks
2025, Harper Muse
371 pages, including acknowledgements and Discussion Questions
Years ago I gave myself permission to stop reading if I couldn’t get into a book. I should have heeded my own consent with Among Friends by Hal Ebbot. I finished it, although with effort. I felt obligated because it was a book group selection.
The novel focuses on the long-standing friendships between two families: Amos, Claire and daughter Anna; Emerson, Retsy and daughter Sophie. Although from different social backgrounds, the men have been best friends for more than 30 years. Emerson and Claire, both come from privilege, have known each most of their lives. The teen girls have grown up together.
They’re together at Emerson’s country home in upstate New York to celebrate his 52nd birthday. Yet, something’s off; there’s an unstated, and apparently unusual, competition between the men.
Later, when Emerson finds himself alone with teenage Anna, something occurs that has the potential to change all their lives. Anna initially doesn’t tell her parents, but when she does they’re torn as to not only what to believe, but more importantly who.
The narrative then gets bogged down with too much about their pasts and it’s easy to question why they’re even friends.
Although Ebbott creates credible tension both with Anna and her parents, along with the adults’ responses, who care?! Retsy and Amos believe Emerson is capable of Anna’s claims; Claire’s ready to dismiss her daughter’s accusation and Emerson is certain he can manipulate the truth.
The characters aren’t people I’d want to know; reading about them was enough.
Among Friends
Two-and-half bookmarks
Random House, 2025
320 pages
Marriage at Sea: A True Story of Love, Obsession and Shipwreck by Sophie Elmhirst is a gripping account of Maralyn and Maurice Bailey’s* exploits at sea.
The subtitle reveals the main elements of the narrative; yet in no way diminishes the situation upon which Elmhirst’s work is based.
The book focuses on three aspects: the couple’s backgrounds, personalities and how they met; next, sailing, shipwreck and days adrift; finally, life after their rescue (this isn’t a spoiler).
Elmhirst first captures readers’ attention by describing how the two met. Despite have similarly unhappy upbringings, their personalities were very different. Maurice was adventuresome, methodical and obstinate in his ways. Maralyn was more carefree and logical. She readily joined Maurice in his daring undertakings.
They set sail from England for New Zealand in a boat they built themselves. This is, initially, the idyllic part of the story. It all dramatically changed after their boat was hit by a whale in the Pacific Ocean far from shore. They spent 118 days at sea, afloat in a dinghy attached to a life raft. Their rations were in short supply, they had no radio and had to rely on each other to survive. How they did so was a lesson in perseverance; primarily on Maralyn’s part. She became more resolute in surviving as Maurice fell into despair.
Elmhirst relied on Maralyn’s journals, newspaper accounts and interviews with those who knew the couple. This is fascinating look at relationships and adventure; the latter section is tiresome, though.
Marriage at Sea: A True Story of Love, Obsession and Shipwreck
Almost-four bookmarks
Riverhead Books, 2025
256 pages
*Photo from nzherald.co.nz
College dropout and drug addict Hai, is about to jump off a bridge in East Gladness, Conn., when he’s talked down by Grazina, an elderly widow, who then invites him into her nearby, rundown home. This is the beginning of Ocean Vuong’s novel The Emperor of Gladness. What ensues is a look at how creating a family can evolve from unlikely relationships.
Hai has lied to his Vietnamese mother about still being in school and, among other things, his sexuality. In fact, he elaborates telling her he’s in medical school. As his friendship with Grazina evolves, he becomes her unofficial caretaker, ensuring she talks her medications and helping her as she relives traumatic flashbacks from when she escaped the war in Lithuania. Nonetheless, she sinks deeper into dementia.
When it becomes clear the pair needs money, he joins his cousin Sony, like the electronics brand, who works in a fast casual restaurant with a group of misfits.
The characters, like the novel itself, are both sad and funny through their distinct personality quirks. Their desperateness is palpable. Sony, who is otherwise not exceptionally bright, is a Civil War savant. Sonny’s mother is in jail and he believes his father is living in Maine.
Vuong’s descriptions are vivid but occasionally longwinded. Despite the author’s colorful details, it’s easy to visualize the desolate town of East Gladness.
Hai’s co-workers at the restaurant are equally adrift, each with their own feelings of loneliness while they unknowingly search for connections.
The Emperor of Gladness
Four Bookmarks
Penguin Press, 2025
402 pages
Sarah and Adam Morgan have been married for 10 years. She’s a successful Washington, D.C., defense attorney; he’s a struggling writer. While professing their love to each other, it’s clear not everything is ideal. She works too much, often missing commitments made to Adam. He’s often on his own. So much, in fact, he’s having an affair. Sarah learns about Adam’s infidelity after he’s accused of murdering his paramour.
Author Jeneva Rose’s The Perfect Marriage has an abundance of twists and turns; in fact, there are too many. There are plenty of obvious suspects besides Adam; there are also characters who suddenly become suspects. The latter really weren’t necessary to add to the mix, but there they are.
Rose also requires her readers to suspend a lot of disbelief. First, Sarah insists on representing her husband. The likelihood of this being allowed is too slim to fathom. Then there’s Adam’s mother who worms herself into situations that also would be unacceptable in criminal cases. The most egregious element of all is the manipulation of the reader’s trust.
Initially, Rose’s characters, particularly Sarah and Adam, are sympathetically portrayed. It’s difficult not to root for them, even though they are far from perfect. Yet, Adam’s imperfections are the most detailed, so at some point it’s easy to wonder what Sarah sees in him.
The relationships with other characters, including the investigating officers, Sarah’s personal assistant and Sarah’s office nemesis all play into the blindsiding outcome.
The strikeout in the word perfect is intentional.
The Perfect Marriage
Three bookmarks
Blackstone Publishing, 2024
375 pages
In The God of the Woods author Liz Moore crafts a fast-paced, engaging mystery that addresses long-held family secrets and the bonds they stretch.
The novel deftly moves between two decades, primarily 1961 and 1975. One August morning of that latter year, at Camp Emerson in rural upstate New York, Barbara, a camper, is discovered missing. What ensues is a search involving local and state authorities.
Although it shouldn’t matter, there’s additional intensity involved in finding the girl: she’s the daughter of the camp’s owner; she’s also the sister of the young boy who disappeared from the same area long ago. The boy’s body was never found creating double intrigue.
Moore’s narrative includes the parents’ histories, how the camp came to exist, vivid descriptions of the environs and several distinct, interesting and strong females. Chief among them are Barbara’s camp counselor, the camp director and a female investigator on her first case. Barbara’s character is also well developed. She comes across as a self-assured teen whose parents give her little attention and is in the shadow of her brother who went missing years before she was born.
Barbara’s family is wealthy and demanding; she’s viewed by her parents, particularly her overbearing father, as a trouble maker. Her mother is easily dismissed by those around her; she’s lost in grief and dependent on pills and alcohol.
There are plenty of theories and possible suspects in both missing persons’ cases, which adds to the whodunit. Yet, Moore’s playbook is far from formulaic.
The God of the Woods
Four Bookmarks
Riverhead Books, 2024
478 pages
Kalmann An Icelandic Mystery
by Joachim B. Schmidt
Kalmann Odinsson, 33, is a man with special needs man: mentally he hasn’t progressed beyond that of a six-year-old; he’s uncoordinated and socially awkward. He lives alone in the small town of Raufarhofn, Iceland, nearly 400 miles from the country’s capital.
Fishing is the primary industry and because of the small population, everyone knows everybody. Most are sympathetic to Kalmann who considers himself the town sheriff. He wears a cowboy hat and has a badge to prove it. He also carries an antique Mauser pistol.
For most of Kalmann’s life, his Grandfather was his constant companion, but the elder man was moved to a senior care facility in another town. Kalmann’s mother also moved away, but frequently checks in on her son.
The best times of his life were those times spent with his Grandfather, which helps explains why Kalmann is as self-sufficient as he is. Although he visits his Grandfather weekly, his absence is deeply felt.
The novel is told from Kalmann’s perspective which is both humorous and, at times, heartbreaking. When he discovers blood while hunting for an Arctic fox, a mystery unfolds. First, whose blood and where is the body?
Despite his limitations, Kalmann is often insightful; and perhaps because of them, he is also frustrated. This is similar to my reaction while reading. This is due largely to the novel’s pacing, which is, at times, laborious. In developing Kalmann’s character in such tedious detail, the author, unfortunately, lets the mystery at hand take the back seat.
Kalmann: An Icelandic Mystery
Bitter Lemon Press, 2022
301 pages
Three bookmarks
Vanessa Miller author of The Filling Station has crafted a novel based on the historic events surrounding the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre.
Greenwood was a prosperous, self-sustaining community known as “Black Wall Street.” It was home to movie theatres, clothing stores, law and medical offices, banks and much more until it was completely destroyed by an angry mob of white men. Homes and businesses were burned to the ground, hundreds died and thousands were displaced.
The narrative focuses on sisters Margaret and Evelyn Justice, the daughters of Greenwood’s grocery store. It’s the eve of Evelyn’s high school graduation and Margaret has returned home from college with an offer to teach in the fall. Evelyn’s been accepted to a fashion design school in New York City.
When the violence begins the Justice girls’ world is upended. Their home is burnt; they left with only the clothes on their backs fleeing for their lives. Exhausted, hungry and afraid they walk for miles before arriving at the Threatt Filling Station, a black-owned business, where they’re taken in by the Threatt family.
The horrific actions and devastating loss are vividly described. Margaret and Evelyn deal with the loss in different ways with the older sister willing herself to find a way forward to rebuild what was taken; and Evelyn looks for ways to numb her pain.
Grief, hope, faith and love are among the many themes Miller weaves. The writing is occasionally stilted, but knowing the factual roots of the story is overwhelmingly powerful.
The Filling Station
3.75 bookmarks
Thomas Nelson, 2025
365 pages, includes Author’s notes, acknowledgements, discussion questions and sources.
The Ministry of Special Cases by Nathan Englander is a gripping narrative about family, sacrifice and grief.
Although those elements are far from uplifting, Englander’s characters demonstrate the power of parental love and the ability to find inner strength where it once seemed impossible to exist.
Set in Buenos Aires during the time of Argentina’s Dirty War when people were “disappeared”, Kaddish Poznan is a ne’er do-well Jew, the illegitimate son of a prostitute. The sins of his mother taint all aspects of Poznan’s life. Only his wife, Lillian, tries to see his potential; but his son, Pato, despises him.
Poznan is always one scheme away from success; some are near brilliant and others simply far-fetched. His steady, albeit clandestine, work involves removing names on tombstones in the Jewish section of a cemetery for wealthy families wanting to stay under the regime’s radar.
When Pato disappears, Poznan and Lillian do everything possible to find him. Much involves needing large sums of money which leads to some humorous but agonizing situations for the parents. In their search for Pato, the couple ends up at the Ministry of Special Cases. This proves to be an exercise in futility thanks to the maze of bureaucratic red tape and ineptitude. All of this stumps Poznan, but motivates Lillian, which creates a rift between them.
Englander’s characters are vividly described as is the situation in Argentine at the time when thousands of people were killed or kidnapped by the country’s military leaving families ripped apart.
The Ministry of Special Cases
Four Bookmarks
Vintage International, 2007
339 pages
When Phoebe Stone abruptly leaves her Midwest college teaching job at the beginning of the semester, she heads to an upscale hotel on the Rhode Island coast. It’s a place she’d always dreamt of going with her husband, but he’s left her for another woman and Phoebe needed to get away; she’s had enough.
Alison Espach’s humorous and compassionate novel, The Wedding People, is as much about self-discovery as it addresses misplaced emotions, chance encounters and probable bad decisions.
The hotel is booked for a weeklong private affair and Phoebe is easily mistaken as a wedding guest; albeit without any luggage. It’s a large group of family and friends. No one takes particular notice until the bride, Lila, realizes Phoebe’s presence has the potential of ruining the festivities. Lila has planned everything, while sparing no expense, practically down to the minute. The unanticipated presence of a stranger could ruin everything.
Yet, Phoebe intrigues Lila, who spends time in the older woman’s room regaling her with the efforts involved in planning the wedding. Phoebe learns how Lila met her fiancé, the relationships she has with her mother, her sister-in-law to be and many of the (invited) guests.
Phoebe assures Lila that she has no intention of being a disruption: she plans to stay at the hotel one night and not interact with anyone. This soon goes awry.
The engaging, well-paced narrative, full of nuanced characters, leads Phoebe to a better understanding of herself, an acceptance of others, new friendships – and more.
The Wedding People
Four Bookmarks
Henry Holt and Co., 2024
367 pages, includes acknowledgements
The Blue Page Special 
