Where'd you go, Bernadette

"But he recognized me.

Manjula, I have no idea how. The only photograph of me floating around was one taken twenty years ago, right before the Huge Hideous Thing. I am beautiful, my face radiating with confidence, my smile bursting with the future of my choosing."

Where'd You Go Bernadette is a wild ride that will leave your head spinning and your fingers tired from putting together the puzzle pieces.

Bernadette is an artistic genius, creating eco-conscious housing creations before being green was cool.

Now, years later, she spends her time in the Airstream trailer in the backyard of the former Seattle reform school for wayward girls. Her husband, a TED-talking, Microsoft guru buries himself in his robotic projects.

Her thirteen year old daughter Bee is the only one still on Bernadette's side. And Bee has convinced her to take a family trip to Antarctica...

Bernadette employs her India-based assistant Manjula to assist her in the planning. But as the date of departure approaches Bernadette's world begins to unravel. Then Bernadette vanishes. Just like she did twenty years ago from LA.

There will be failed projects, unplanned pregnancies, spiritual awakenings, boat theft, Russian Mafia, FBI, psychologists, interventions, all intricately woven together through memos, letters, emails, and conversations collected by Bee.

Bee will be left to delicately piece together this humorous tale of a life gone awry.

But, will it lead Bee to her mother, or more importantly, does she want to be found?

This story is a perfect read for anyone suffering from winter wanderlust, or just looking for a wacky story to keep you on your toes.

A Year in Books

My favorite new(ish) author:

Sarah Jio

 

 

I got a bit caught up in southern-based stories, and Jio brought me overseas to a mysterious beach bungalow on Bora Bora during World War II in The Bungalow. Then I went to solve a murder mystery at a London Manor in The Last Camellia. Next I was off to an island in Washington state sifting through a velvet diary to uncover secrets of the past in the Violets of March. And lastly, to Seattle where a modern-day reporter uncovers a long ago kidnapping, while identical Blackberry Winter storms, decades apart, help unravel a mystery. Her books are full of mysteries and secrets, links to the past, and incredible settings.

The book that stuck with me the most:

The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman

 

This book reaches deep into your soul and tests your morality. You are left wondering what is right and what is wrong, and where that line can be drawn. If ever a book has made me cry for its beauty and its sadness, this is it.

 

Genre I've been enjoying:

Historical Fiction, often with a mix or link to a current day story

Favorite "summer" book:

A Hundred Summers by Beatriz Williams

 

I love a good summer escape! Add in the retro vibes of a classic beach town in Rhode Island and I was sold. New England, beach, love, broken hearts and broken friendships, and a real hurricane. It's enough drama to last the whole summer through.

Favorite "fresh start" book:

On Folly Beach by Karen White

 

Emmy has lost her soldier husband  to the war in Iraq and is now a young war widow. She moves to quiet Folly Beach on the South Carolina shore.  Folly Beach is the perfect setting: its quiet beauty and mysterious pier are paired nicely with its quirky residents, most knowingly bottle-tree making Lulu. Here she takes over a book store and begins to find mysterious letters, sandwiched in the pages of classic stories, tucked away in the corner, and begins unraveling a mystery that spans decades. This story connects the heartbreak of war and loss with the sense of hope and renewal in the human spirit, and the drive of curiosity that will uncover unexpected events...

Frighteningly gripping book:

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

 

I couldn't decide who I hated the most in this one. I couldn't decide who to blame. Or where on earth the last week of my life went once I picked it up. With every chapter the story twists and turns, testing your loyalty to its cast of damaged characters. I was enthralled and (somewhat) disgusted, but oh boy, I can't wait to see the movie.

Favorite Series:

 

The House on Tradd Street by Karen White

 

Beautiful old houses, haunting historic Charleston setting....what could be better?

 

My Favorite Book for Children:

 

 

City Dog, Country Frog by Mo Willems

 

 

This is not exactly new to me this year. It was given to me when I left my first teaching job to move across the U.S.A., from the country to the city...(sentimental much?)

 

Country Frog is waiting for his friend. City Dog comes along. "You'll do" he says. And for each season of the year, these unlikely friends will hop and run through the beautiful, heartfelt pages. Simple, poetic prose. They are the sweetest of friends.

 Just finished: The Paris Wife by Paula McLain

"I would gladly have climbed out of my skin and into his that night, because I believed that was what love meant. Hadn't I just felt us collapsing into one another, until there was no difference between us?

It would be the hardest lesson of my marriage, discovering the flaw in this thinking. I couldn't reach into every part of Ernest and he didn't want me to."

And there went my evenings until I had devoured this book. I was desperate to know how it all would end. An impossible feeling on page 59 of a 314 page book. But don't worry, I won't spoil it for you-I'll just make you nearly as desperate as I was to crawl and collapse into this book for a night or two.

This is no spoiler;if you know Hemingway, you know his Paris Wife was not his one and only. We already know the ending. You don't read it to find out what happened, but to understand why. 

Hadley Richardson is naïve and head-over-heels in love. The scribbled words on endless sheets of letter paper are what bring them together, and this same frantic passion that drives them together will eventually ruin them. She falls in love with his words and becomes consumed by his promises. He falls in love with her support and steadfast loyalty.

 The book follows them on their journey from meeting in Chicago at a small party (who wants to marry someone named Ernest Hemingway? What kind of name is that?-her friend exclaims). The book leads them to the stumbling down the uneven streets of Paris in a drunken stupor alongside the even more intoxicated and wild Fitzgerald. James Joyce walks the streets with his throngs of children in tow, and Gertrude Stein counsels Hemingway on his writing. As good as Hemingway might've been at making friends, his growing ego will cause him enemies. I felt excited as I recognized famous characters sprawled across the pages. I know them!

Hadley is the woman who doesn't quite fit, the one each man wants to have as his wife, but no longer his muse. Instead she'll watch as his writing takes over, and she becomes the character written out of the plot. But there is a quiet strength that Hadley possesses that will keep you turning the pages, and after breaking down your resolve, McLain will remind you that no love is ever lost.

“The first and final thing you have to do in this world is to last it and not be smashed by it.”
― Ernest Hemingway

Ironically, it will be Hadley who is able to do just that.



Currently Reading : Girl in the Blue Dress

Moving on to: Hemingway's Boat, A Farewell to Arms