Book Review: Solomon’s Oak by Jo-Ann Mapson

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . December 30, 2011 . 9:47PM

Usually, I don’t jump right into my reviews, but Solomon’s Oak by Jo-Ann Mapson was so compelling that I feel like I need to get right down to it today. I was lucky enough to snag a copy of this from an early review program, which is odd because this book actually came out in hardback in 2010 and is available on Amazon.com for a bargain price right now! Frankly, I’m shocked that the price was lowered because this was one of my favorite reads this year.

Solomon’s Oak introduces us to Glory, a newly widowed woman who is still grieving for her husband and desperately trying to make ends meet. When the local social worker comes calling and asks her to take on a new foster child, something Glory and her late husband had frequently done with open arms, Glory isn’t sure that she has it in her to help Juniper through her adolescent issues. With the help of Joseph, an out-of-towner who has some issues of his own, Glory and Juniper discover that family is often who you make it.

This book has a lot of backstory for each character and that makes it a fascinating read. Almost all of the characters have some sort of dynamic movement throughout the novel, including the minor characters. Sometimes when an author goes that route the book because a busy mish-mash of too many spoons in the soup. However, Solomon’s Oak is written with a perfect, delicate balance that left me bouncing between the characters and while I was on one part of the story I found myself longing to know what another character was doing. Jo-Ann Mapson did a lovely job tying these characters together and really weaving a beautiful picture of what life is like for them.

None of the stories are easy to read. The characters in this book are struggling to deal with issues that are real world issues. However, the empathy that Mapson allows the reader to feel is more than adequate to allow for a bonding between reader and character without making the book overly sappy or the characters overly pitiful or pathetic in their griefs.

I think this is a lovely book that is worth a read. It may not be your favorite of the year, but you won’t forget it. You may find yourself wondering where the characters are heading and if they realize what they’ve gained in the process. It’s a nice journey.

Edit: I received a free copy of this book in order to review it. Thank you for allowing me to share my opinions on it!

Book Review: The Night Strangers by Chris Bohjalian

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . November 17, 2011 . 7:15PM

I’ve read quite a few books by Chris Bohjalian, and one of my favorites of his is The Double Bind. I haven’t read anything until this point that compared to that book as to how it evoked feeling within me. I was curious as to this book, The Night Strangers, when I read the synopsis because I do enjoy a good ghost story. When you throw in the aspect of psychological trauma and mental thriller, well, I wonder if Chris Bohjalian tailor-made this book for me? I began reading this book right around Halloween and that made it even better for me in that the skies around my house were turning gray and the wind was blowing and the day I finished this book it was a dark and spooky night that was pouring rain. It was one of those nights that gives you the shivers by its very nature and it added to the drama of this book. I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s talk about the plot for a minute.

The public fascination with a pilot’s heroic landing in the Hudson is at the forefront of every pilot’s mind. Some pilots have looked at “Sully’s” real life landing as the fantasy job–the chance to show off amazing skill, save the passengers and fly the best planes while gaining fame for being the best at his job. Chris Linton is one of those pilots. He’s fantasized and read about everything Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger did since he heard about the landing. What Chris doesn’t realize is that he is about to have his chance to pull a Sully.

The beginning of the novel takes us into the cockpit of a plane heading for disaster. Chris and his co-pilot Amy are flying a routine flight when they hit a flock of geese who are sucked into their engines, causing a stall-out and forcing Chris to make the decision to land in the local lake. When Chris makes a solid landing, a ferry sends a wave over the plane and capsizes it breaking it into pieces. Thirty-nine passengers die, including his co-pilot, and Chris is deeply traumatized. This trauma seeps into his homelife with his wife, Emily, and twin daughters, Hallie and Garnet. Emily makes the decision to leave her law-firm and move the family to the sleepy little town of Bethel, far from the paparazzi, so Chris can find himself again and the family can have some peace. What Emily doesn’t know is that the town of Bethel has secrets of its own.

Emily is immediately confronted by a couple of the townspeople who attempt to warn her about the “herbalists” that she spends her time with and the house that she and her family bought. They say little, though, and seem fearful to give her details. Eventually, these interactions will come back to haunt Emily as her family becomes more and more drawn into what is happening in the town greenhouses and a story of a murder that took place in her own home. Will Emily be able to save her family and keep Chris from falling into the madness that threatens to consume him?

The book was full of twists, paranormal turns and small truths. There were times that events in the book were incredibly plausible yet so far-fetched that it made me question the line between sanity and insanity and reality and fiction. Could it happen? Yes. Could it be true? Maybe. The ending was shocking to me, to say the least, and never did I feel like I knew with absolute certainty what was happening at any point. I did feel a couple of events were predictable, but only because Chris Bohjalian is a master at putting out the fishing line and then reeling me in.

If you like a thriller with a little bit of psychological mischief and little bit of shivering your timbers, grab this book. If you want a book that is entertaining and yet you might need to take a break from it at night, grab this book. If you want a book that is worth the money you spent on it because it will entertain you over the long haul, grab this book. By far, his best work to date.

Note: I got this book for free in order to review it. Thank you for allowing me to share my opinions with others.

Book review: Irma Voth by Miriam Toews

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . September 10, 2011 . 7:41PM

Irma Voth is a young adult who struggles with things she can’t control. Her husband, Jorge, is a drug dealer who is uninterested in her both as a wife and as a person. To Irma, the bigger issue between them is that Irma comes from a Mennonite background and things that she feels should come naturally to her as a woman and intuitively as a person about her surroundings just don’t. Jorge is a Mexican man, living in Mexico, who expects that his wife will be able to conform to societies standards and lacks a basic understanding of the world in which she became a person. To top it off, they live on her parent’s land and Irma constantly deals with the threat from her father that he will throw her out if Jorge, who is off dealing drugs, doesn’t come home and work the farm. Her younger sister, Aggie, constantly begs Irma to allow her to come live with her as things at home are getting worse. The bottom line? Young Irma has a lot on her mind.

The thin balance that Irma has managed to eek out is tested when a movie director comes to town and looks for a translator that speaks Dutch German. Irma needs the money, as Jorge is gone, and eagerly accepts the job offer. Her work on the film triggers a serious of events that lead to an uproar in the lives of everyone she holds dear.

Irma Voth by Miriam Toews is a strongly written novel about the ways that our life is a safety blanket and if we let go of the familiar how much we stand to gain and how much we can lose. Irma is a sympathetic character with stilted dialogue and I constantly found myself wishing that I could help her in some way, but realizing that she brought many troubles on herself. When Irma finally stands up for herself I found myself wishing that she could be more thoughtful and not make bad decisions, however, the bad decisions were consistent with her character as someone who was highly sheltered. My frustration does not make her an inconsistent character.

Overall, the book was a good read, though a little short. I was a little confused by the ending, as well as many of the laws in Mexico, I suppose, but otherwise, this was a good read. It’s not a fast read or a beach read, rather, it’s going to be a thoughtful one with a decently moving storyline.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book in order to review it and share my opinion.

Book Review: The Grief of Others by Leah Cohen

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . September 2, 2011 . 5:35PM

Sometimes it takes me a while to determine how I feel about a novel. In the first 6 pages of The Grief of Others by Leah Cohen, I recognized this book was special. I found myself clutching my chest as I empathized and closing my eyes because sometimes you can find magic in a novel. In the introduction, the author describes how Ricky, the mother in the novel, longs to bottle her infant’s breaths so she can keep them forever. I related to this so much. Even though my son is now 10, I find myself having those thoughts at times.

Throughout the novel, we find the family of four, John, Ricky, Paul and their daughter Biscuit, struggle to come to grips with the death of their infant, Simon. Simon was born with a defect that led to his head not fully forming and he died within 3 days of birth. Ricky, who knew he was going to have this defect, chose not to disclose this to anyone, including John, and the repercussions of this come to affect everyone in the family, even John’s daughter from a former relationship, who shows up on their doorstep.

There is no protagonist in this novel. There are equal amounts of grief and distress for all of the characters in this book and I felt my heart reach out to them equally. Frequently I wondered why the adults in this novel had such difficulty connecting to their children. Even prior to the death of Simon, John and Ricky still did not seem to have a great ability to reach out to Paul and Biscuit. This manifests in Biscuit cutting school and enacting death rituals to celebrate the life of Simon and Paul’s inability to sleep at night and allowing himself to be bullied at school. Jessica, John’s first child, shows up on their doorstep after no contact for eight years, pregnant and mysterious.

The difficulty with this novel is the disjointed nature of the situations. No one in the novel seems capable of connecting with anyone else on any level. The self-absorbed nature of people is on display and it made it hard to want good things for them. However, the very realistic situations that were portrayed and Ricky’s expression of feelings for the child she lost could absolutely take my breath away, at times. This hints to me that there could have been a great deal more to this story, but with so much going on, it just felt lost to me. Overall, I’d recommend it as a read for those that may need someone to relate to who is going through grief and for those that feel to raw to express this to other people. I never really understood the grief of anyone but Biscuit and Ricky, but maybe that can be enough. I have lukewarm feelings but some of the writing was so beautifully done that I am reluctant to give this a bad review. It’s worth it for those brief moments of inspiration alone.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book in order to review it and share my thoughts.

Book review: Everything We Ever Wanted: A Novel by Sara Shepard

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . August 19, 2011 . 10:58PM

Lately, it seems like the books I’ve been given to review contain a cast of unlikable characters who are riddled with flaws in an attempt to be dynamic and real and the bottom line is that I often read for escape and isn’t life hard enough? In Everything We Ever Wanted: A Novel by Sara Shepard, we are given a brief glance into the life of the Bates-McAllister family and I’m not sure I could take much more than a glance. People have problems and in no small amount and the people you might believe have the fewest might be hiding the most.

The Bates-McAllister family has recently lost their patriach, James, in an unexpected way. Their matriach, Sylvie, feels the weight of the world upon her as she comes to grips with the person she thinks James has been throughout their marriage and the secrets that are now being shared about him in his death. In the novel, she learns that the people you surround yourself with are not necessarily your friends and the family that you choose to shun just might be those that save you.

We are also introduced to Charles, James and Sylvie’s biological son, and his wife, Joanna. The book reveals that their relationship began tattered and has continued to shred with both looking back on the life they had before one another and the life that might have been had they not chosen one another. The secrets they have kept from each other threaten to tear the marriage apart and their saga was of the few parts of the story that left me vaguely unsettled. The end of the novel left loose ends where they were concerned and it seemed like they were glossed over to address Sylvie and her ability to move forward in life and how Scott progressed.

Scott is the inevitable center of the novel, though the premise of the novel is supposed to be the family. Scott is the adopted son of the family, a mixed-race child who has brought grief to the family since they adopted him at 18-months. In a stunning turn of events, it may be Scott that has the most heart and love and concern for his family members as each of their true motivations is revealed.

I’m still not sure I found a likable character in the bunch and the ending of the story still left me confused as to what was happening and why I should care for these people, however, sometimes you just have to enjoy the journey. I felt like the ending was rushed and thrown together, but the novel moved at a rapid pace until that point and I enjoyed reading it. There was just enough suspense throughout the book to keep me interested and I kept hoping for some redemption. This is another novel that highlights that, at times, people are highly unlikable in bad circumstances but can persevere with hope.

If you prefer a tightly bound ending that answers all your questions, this book won’t work for you. If you are alright with some ambiguity, give it a try.

Disclaimer: I received this book for free to review it. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to share my opinions with others.