And plant our dreams where the peaceful river flows: THE LIFEGUARDS.

The Lifeguards by Amanda Eyre Ward
My rating: 3+ of 5 stars

In a luxurious Austin, TX neighborhood, a group of three women have formed a friendship around their sons, now teenagers. Their neighborhood is filled with greenbelts, open space, and pools, including the one where their sons are lifeguards. Whitney, Annette, and Liza come from different backgrounds, but feel like their friendship is as strong as ever. They are enjoying a happy hour one evening when the boys come home, saying they found a body on the greenbelt. The discovery will change everything.

"But our friendship was unbreakable, as safe as the neighborhood where we'd raised our sweet little kids. Or so we thought. By the end of the summer, one of us would be gone."

LIFEGUARDS is told from the perspective of the three women, along with, Joe, the local detective charged with investigating the body. It's certainly the kind of story that keeps you reading. It's part mystery, part family drama. Still, I confess that it's hard to truly engage in a story revolving around rich women (and their husbands) trying to protect their spoiled, rich children. I liked Charlie (Liza's son) and Joe, though.

This is an interesting story, if not a particularly original one. It will keep your attention, but probably won't stick with you long. 3+ stars.

I received a copy of this from Random House / Ballantine and Netgalley in return for an unbiased review.

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She starts to dream and then she stops herself: THE JETSETTERS.

The Jetsetters by Amanda Eyre Ward

My rating: 3.75 of 5 stars


Charlotte Perkins is 71, and her best friend has just died. Long single, she longs to be touched and loved again, so she writes an essay (a rather racy one at that) to the "Become a Jetsetter" contest to win a trip for her entire family (and to perhaps meet someone). Charlotte is shocked and elated when she actually wins, earning the the chance to take her three children to Athens, Greece and on a nine-day cruise to Barcelona, Spain. Lee, a struggling actress who has just returned home on a "break" from acting (and from her famous ex-boyfriend) figures she has nothing better to do. Cord, her son, a wealthy New Yorker, isn't thrilled about being trapped on a ship while he struggles with his sobriety. And Regan, an exhausted mother of two daughters, can't believe it when her irritating husband Matt joins the group. This will be a particularly fun trip since Lee and Regan haven't spoken in ten years. Trapped on this adventure together, secrets come out and the Perkins family suddenly learns more than they ever wanted to know about each one another.

It took me a while to process this one. I really enjoy Amanda Eyre Ward's writing, and I have such a soft spot for her book, The Same Sky, which is one of my absolute favorite novels. This book is very different from that one, and it took me some time to warm to the pacing and the characters. Charlotte turned me off in the beginning, and I was just slow to get into the book. We learn that the Perkins kids had a rough childhood, but one that also bonded them together. Yet when the book opens, none of them are particularly close to each other--or their mother.


"This day, and the two more excruciating days that followed--days of sand and beer-scented misery--would be the last time Lee went on vacation with her mother and siblings. Until thirty-two years later, when they became jetsetters."


The book presents the story from not only Charlotte's point of view, but that of each of her wayward children. None of the kids are easy to like at first, but Ward's prose makes them come to life before our eyes. They are fallible, for sure, and it's hard not to feel a bit sorry for everyone. I for one am not sure I could handle being trapped on a cruise ship with a group of unhappy family members.


"Oh. Charlotte's children. To her great sadness and bewilderment, Charlotte's three adult children were lost to her, and perhaps to themselves."


The novel does an excellent job at portraying all the difficult relationships in the book, giving us an in-depth portrait of a complicated family. While the story is told solely over the span of their trip, we learn all about Charlotte's life--much of it hidden away from her children--and the lives of her three kids, even bits and pieces of their childhood and backstories. No one has had an easy go of it, for sure. How much do parents, and their actions, affect their kids, the book asks. How do families in general influence the people we become. They have so much power: both to help and to hurt.

It's funny, this wasn't always a story I enjoyed, even though there are humorous and touching moments, but I recognized its powerful parts too. Overall, I would rate this at 3.75 stars, rounded up to 4 stars here. It's worth a read.

I received a copy of this book from Random House - Ballantine and Netgalley in return for an honest review. It is out today, 3/3/2020!

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Tuesday's Book Bag: New Releases for 2/21.

It's been a quiet February in terms of new releases on the blog, but today we feature two novels by popular contemporary authors, Clare Mackintosh and Amanda Eyre Ward. Mackintosh became famous with her debut release, I LET YOU GO, which was an amazing and surprising thriller. Ward has published a variety of novels, but her last book, THE SAME SKY, was a very timely look at race, immigration, and the American Dream. Both works were well-written and extremely well-received, which immediately begs the question: could their next novels live up to the hype?

Clare Mackintosh's new thriller, I SEE YOU, tells the story of Zoe Walker, a busy mother of two grown children. Her partner, Simon, works for a local paper, and Zoe is divorced from her kids' father. One day, Zoe spots an ad in the classifieds that appears to feature her photo. The ad features a website and phone number, but Zoe cannot get into the password-protected site. The next day, the same ad shows a photo of another woman, and so on and so on. Meanwhile, Detective Kelly Swift is struggling to get back in the good graces of the police force after an incident derailed her career. Kelly is working a series of tube (subway)-related incidents, but she really wants to get back into real investigating. When Kelly and Zoe's paths cross, it doesn't seem as if Zoe is in any real danger, but that all changes suddenly. For me, I LET YOU GO was such an amazing novel with an amazing twist and this one didn't quite live up to my expectations. It's certainly an interesting novel with an intriguing premise, but I didn't buy the idea outside of a novel. You sort of have to suspend disbelief to allow yourself to read on with the plot: even though it's rooted in technology and our society's obsession with technology and dating, the overall construct just seems to be a stretch. The beginning portion of the novel was compelling, but slow, and I kept waiting for it to pick up. I also could see a lot of the plot pieces coming. I liked Kelly's chapters so much more and found myself a bit annoyed going back to Zoe at times - she was whiny and irritating for a while. Kelly was far more nuanced (though a bit too focused on the past), but her chapters were far better at adding suspense and tension. The novel certainly does pick up nearing the end, and I definitely wanted to find out what happened and who was responsible for what. But even then, the motivation for the "bad guy" was a bit odd and poorly done. Like a lot of the plot, it seemed a bit of a stretch. It was saved somewhat by the epilogue, which offered a good twist (although I had my suspicions), but I wasn't sure it made up for the whole book, and it didn't make me gasp like her first book. (Poor author, being held up to impossible follow-on standards.) Overall, I did find this novel puzzling, though hindered somewhat but a slightly preposterous plot. I'm glad I read it, but I certainly prefer her first novel. (I'll still eagerly await anything from Mackintosh, however!) 3 stars

In Ward's novel, THE NEARNESS OF YOU, Suzette and Hyland have a happy marriage and a busy life when Hyland surprises his wife with the news that he really wants a child. Married fifteen years, children had always been off the table, as Suzette did not want to pass on the genes of her mother, a woman who gave Suzette a horrifying and unstable childhood and eventually wound up in a mental institution. But Hyland proposes a new solution: what if they use a surrogate, with his sperm and a surrogate's egg? Suzette, a busy and successful heart surgeon, reluctantly agrees. Even though there are some red flags, the couple eventually chooses young Dorrie, a woman who wants to use the surrogate fees to go to college. Dorrie and Hyland bond, and Suzette realizes she must get on board with the idea. But soon Dorrie will make some decisions that will affect everyone in this new trio. Much like with Mackintosh, I am a bit conflicted about this novel. I so adored THE SAME SKY, which is a beautiful novel and one everyone should read in this current political climate. It's hard not to compare others to that magical book, and this one did fall short. Ward does, however, have a way of weaving stories with her words, and while I wasn't nearly as attached to the characters in this novel, I still found myself reading the last half of the book somewhat compulsively. The novel started out slow, but picked up about 1/4 through, with a twist in the plot. It's told from a shifting rotation of perspectives, including Suzette, Dorrie, and Hyland. There are some large shifts in time as the novel progresses, which did make it harder to attach to some of the characters. None of the plot twists are exactly surprise, as they are foreshadowed a bit in each character's description: this is more of a character-driven novel versus a shocking dramatic novel. Still, even though I tore through the last half of the novel, I just felt the book lacked something, and I felt a tad let down by a story and characters that weren't completely fully developed (the ending is a bit abrupt as well). I enjoyed the perspectives on motherhood that the novel offered, but felt there could be more. That's not to say the novel isn't worth reading; Ward is a wonderful writer, but I just felt a little perplexed and frustrated when this one ended. I had hoped for more. 3 stars

I'd still recommend reading both of these novels - they are interesting, even if not as diverse and fascinating as their predecessors. Happy reading, everyone! (And thanks to Netgalley for copies of these novels.)

I like to flip through all my pages of past: THE NEARNESS OF YOU.

The Nearness of You by Amanda Eyre Ward

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Suzette and Hyland have a happy marriage and a busy life when Hyland surprises his wife with the news that he really wants a child. Married fifteen years, children had always been off the table, as Suzette did not want to pass on the genes of her mother, a woman who gave Suzette a horrifying and unstable childhood and eventually wound up in a mental institution. But Hyland proposes a new solution: what if they use a surrogate, with his sperm and a surrogate's egg? Suzette, a busy and successful heart surgeon, reluctantly agrees. Even though there are some red flags, the couple eventually chooses young Dorrie, a woman who wants to use the surrogate fees to go to college. Dorrie and Hyland bond, and Suzette realizes she must get on board with the idea. But soon Dorrie will make some decisions that will affect everyone in this new trio.

I am a bit conflicted about this novel. Ward wrote The Same Sky, which is a beautiful novel and one everyone should read in this current political climate. It's hard not to compare others to that magical book, and this one did fall short. She does, however, have a way of weaving stories with her words, and while I wasn't nearly as attached to the characters in this novel, I still found myself reading the last half of the book somewhat compulsively.

The novel started out slow, but picked up about 1/4 through, with a twist in the plot. It's told from a shifting rotation of perspectives, including Suzette, Dorrie, and Hyland. There are some large shifts in time as the novel progresses, which did make it harder to attach to some of the characters. None of the plot twists are exactly surprise, as they are foreshadowed a bit in each character's description: this is more of a character-driven novel versus a shocking dramatic novel. Still, even though I tore through the last half of the novel, I just felt the book lacked something, and I felt a tad let down by a story and characters that weren't completely fully developed (the ending is a bit abrupt as well). I enjoyed the perspectives on motherhood that the novel offered, but felt there could be more. That's not to say the novel isn't worth reading; Ward is a wonderful writer, but I just felt a little perplexed and frustrated when this one ended. I had hoped for more.

I received a copy of this novel from the publisher and Netgalley (thank you!); it is available everywhere as of 02/21/2017.



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The truth's always been found in your life story.

I recently joined the website, Netgalley, which gives you a chance to read advanced copies of books, in return for offering unbiased reviews of those books.


I lucked out and was approved to read novels by two authors that I very much enjoy - Amanda Eyre Ward and Monica McInerney.


McInerney's new novel, Hello from the Gillespies, takes place in Australia, and focuses on Angela Gillespie, a displaced Londoner, living with her husband on a station in the Australian outback. Every year, Angela sends out a sunny Christmas card (now email) with the title "Hello from the Gillespies" chronicling life with her husband Nick, their three daughters, and young son. This year, though, her life has gone a bit awry and the typical happy words don't flow. She ends up writing a bitter (but true) diatribe (think way personal journal entry) and not sending it. When she's called away to tend to her injured son, she doesn't close down the computer. Her husband finds it later that evening--and knowing how much the Christmas letter means to his wife--sends her innermost personal thoughts out to a 100 of their closest family and friends without even reading it.


From there, the story unfolds in somewhat predictable ways - I mean, you sort of know how the tale will end. There's a little bit of an outlandish twist, as well. However, having read previous McInerney books, I think that's a bit of what you come for. Some comforting, family tales that are believable despite their craziness. The novel is completely engrossing. Personally, I was fascinated by the relationship of her older twin daughters (having two year-old twin daughters myself and wondering what they'll be like as adults - hopefully not as confused and wayward as Angela's girls, although they had good hearts!). McInerney is wonderful at creating completely different and believable characters that you can completely picture - each of the daughters and the son, "Ig" were perfectly drawn. Overall, I think McInerney captures the ups and downs of marriage and family life quite accurately and poignantly and reminds us never to take things (or our loved ones) for granted -- even if our day-to-day lives aren't quite as fantastical as the Gillespies. I'd rate this 3.5 stars on 5 star scale.


Amanda Eyre Ward's latest novel, however: is just a beautiful book. Ward's writing is simply lovely and magical. When I finished the book, I was left feeling a bit disappointed - not by the plot or the writing, but that it was over. It's one of those novels that I'll be recommending to everyone.


The Same Sky tells the story of two unique individuals. The first is Alice, a forty-year-old living in Texas, with her husband. Together, they run a successful BBQ restaurant and appear incredibly happy. But they've been through a long and sad string of infertility, and Alice is left empty by the latest episode - a birth-mother taking back a baby promised to her, after Alice spent the night with the baby she thought was going to be hers.


Alice's chapters alternate with those of Carla, a young girl in Honduras. Carla's mother leaves for America early in the story, leaving Carla with her grandmother and one of her younger twin brothers. Carla's voice is just amazing. Ward captures this young teenager perfectly. I'm not sure how you can read this book and not fall completely for Carla. There are times when I didn't completely love Alice, or when I wanted to shake her, but Carla - I just wanted to hug her and take her home.


As you read the novel, Alice and Carla's stories are completely separate, which is fascinating. They provide an intriguing commentary on our society and the American Dream -- Alice seems to have it all in America, but she feels empty due to her childless state. And Carla wants nothing more than to come to America with her mother.


I simply loved the book - I won't give away any more of the plot, but it was well-written and beautiful. This story also hit home to me -- reading about Alice's infertility struggles. And Carla and her little brothers reminded me of so many of the little ones my Mom had taught over the years.
I don't think you could be disappointed in reading The Same Sky - I give it 4.5 out of 5 stars.