You are the Love of my Life

You Are the Love of My Life by Susan Richards Shreve
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Lucy Painter has always kept secrets - it had been well taught to her by her mother after Lucy's beloved and famous father committed suicide in the Summer of '51. Now in the Winter of 1973 Lucy, single mom of teen Maggie and cuddly, sweet Felix, is moving back to her hometown of DC and the same house her father hanged himself. With her, Maggie will still carry all the shameful secrets, hauled back and forth across country, secrets that have become larger, secrets that even her children do not know. While hanging ever tighter to her encumbered baggage, Lucy continues to push people away, even her own daughter until it's almost too late....

A very interesting novel - I liked reading about DC in the early 70s. 12 going on 13 in 1973 and just getting ready to enter our 9-12th school here in Western Maryland, I remember hearing about the Watergate scandal and President Nixon and watching coverage on our B&W TV. (I won't mention how my father became agitated watching the only three channels we could get!) Another turbulent time in our lives...

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Little Night

Little Night by Luanne Rice
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

In New York City lived two perfect and exceptionally close daughters , Anne and Clare Burke. From their father's affairs they learned to keep secrets and from their mother - acceptance and resignation. To escape their parent's constant fighting, they roamed Central Park and discovered raptors in the night. Now grown up and grown apart from the horrible event, almost 20 years ago, that placed Clare in lock up for two long years, Clare is trying to slowly move on with her life. When Anne's daughter Grit shows up alone are her doorstep, memories are relived, hatred is brought alive, but healing and forgiveness that has been buried deep in the bog - begin at last....

"Their old house, the poem, birds, history, and their own imaginations delivered them from family unhappiness. Born city girls, they learned early to escape into nature. Central Park was a haven, thirty-seven blocks and a world away from home. Exploring the park and the dusty corners of their own house taught the girls to look for meaning, magic, and comfort in places they least expected it."


Another great contemporary read from Luanne Rice.

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Summer Breeze

Summer Breeze by Nancy Thayer
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Three women, with common quandaries, move to beautiful Dragonfly Lake, surrounded by woodland in the Berkshires. For Bella, it's just a move back home - it's where she grew up surrounded by family. Her Mom unfortunately fell from a ladder, breaking her leg, so Bella gave up her teaching job in Texas and hurried home to run her Mom's shop. Natalie is house-sitting for her aunt and hoping the quiet summer will help her return to the passion of painting. Morgan, a hazardous materials expert, and married to a brilliant young man climbing the ladder at Bio-Green Industries , at first is happy to stay home and care for their young son, Petey, only a year old. As the families get to know each other and connect on deeper levels, the summer moves on, old romances grow deeper and new love begins around the lovely old lake.

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Objects of My Affection: A Novel

Objects of My Affection: A Novel by Jill Smolinski

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


A humorous look at a down-on-her-luck organizer, Lucy Bloom, who takes on the daunting challenge of defusing the "professional hoarder" and eccentric artist Marva Meier Rios' Craftman's style home of excess clutter - some useless and some worth a great deal of cash. Lucy, who just wrote a book, that bombed in sales, on organizing your home not only has to be more than good at her job but also be discreet. Heaven forbid if a newspaper reporter would get a juicy story out of Marva's mess! Lucy's carrot at the end of the stick is an added bonus, that hopefully, will pay for Ash's, her drug addicted son, expensive stay at a rehab clinic. But extracting Marva's precious articles from her clenched fingers is not only time-consuming but exhausting and the due date is unfortunately approaching soon.

With "hoarding" now being a household name and object of many a TV show, this is a timely funny, fictional story and repeats what we now know - we emotionally hang onto our "things" to replace relationships and brings us memories of good times & good places.



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