As I mentioned previously, my reading mojo has returned. Lately there is nothing to do but bake, eat, sleep, walk the dog and read. Luckily the last three books I have read (and one I am listening to on CD in my car) have all been good. Without further ado and in no particular order:
"Nothing To See Here" by Kevin Wilson is so quirky in its premise that I had no great desire to read it. But it was available for downloading onto my Portable Device (i.e. phone) that I opted to get it and am so glad I did. (Side note: not all books are available to download and I do not like reading books on my PD (i.e. phone) but one takes what one can get in these troubled times. Right?)
This story is about, ostensibly, a sort-of loser woman in her mid 20's who doesn't have a real job who is contacted by the woman she loved in her brief stint in college to watch over a set of sort-of orphaned twins who ..... can set themselves on fire. No wonder no one wants to be a nanny to fire kids, and these aren't cute, cuddly kids either. OK, you can see why I hesitated to read this book, it sounded too contrived to be even half-way reasonable. But the thing is this: not only does it become reasonable, it becomes much more than that. It becomes real. Lillian, the mid-20's sort-of nanny, realizes that she can not only help these kids, but that the kids are real and needy and loving and (....wait for it....) so is she! In the end it's a great story about shedding one's past and embracing the vagaries of life and its uncertainties and insecurities. And in the end, it's a great story of love and how kindness can overcome even children who can set themselves on fire.
Read it if you get the chance. Right now, with everything that is happening in our world, danger, fire, death, virus, evil.... this book is a little tonic for all of that. Wrap your arms and your soul and heart around this little book and love it.
Whew. Didn't mean to get so philosophical there.
OK, book number two is a first novel and you all know I approach first novels with trepidation. This one was better than most. "Such A Fun Age" by Kiley Reid is a book for right now. A young (again mid-20's) black woman is a babysitter for a rich white family and one evening Emira has the little kid in an upscale (i.e. expensive) grocery store and is confronted by the security guard questioning if that little white girl is supposed to be with that over-dressed black woman. Well, things happen, nothing bad, but repercussions ensue, of course. The novel goes on to the explore Emira's relationship to her employers, Alix and Peter, and there's lots of race and economic issues that are tossed about. Reviews of this book have made much of the black-vs-white themes in the relationships but I am not going to get into those. Read the reviews. But it's a good story of one woman trying to find her way in a world that isn't hers but maybe could be someday. Emira loves the little girl she takes care of but that little girl's future is one that Emira will never have. She needs to figure out where she is in all of that. Eventually, she does.
Those two books were surprisingly good and I had little expectations for them. I enjoyed both of them. "Nothing To See Here" made me almost cry at the end because Lillian had so much to lose and so little to hold on to but she landed on her feet. In "Such a Fun Age" I was a little more confident that Emira would figure it out.... and she did and carried on. Neither book was pandering and both were well done.
Two more books to review. Tune in tomorrow. (And that means you, Ms. Mahalo.)
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