One character’s coma is only the first surprise in this satisfying story of middle-aged love.
What if Snow White woke up and decided she didn’t much like Prince Charming?
Something like that happens in Leavitt's latest novel. New Yorkers Simon and Stella have been a couple since the heady days when his rock band was almost famous. Now in their 40s, he’s still chasing musical fame while Stella, a skilled and well-regarded nurse, supports them both and generally is the adult in the relationship. The night before they’re supposed to leave for a gig in California that might be his big break, they have a nasty argument, drink a lot of wine, and, despite Stella’s aversion to drug abuse, share an unidentified pill. In the morning, Simon wakes up and Stella doesn’t. Her coma lasts for several months. The middle section of the book alternates among Simon’s anguished guilt and devotion to caring for her, Stella’s hallucinatory experiences while comatose, and the reactions of Stella’s best friend, Libby, who is one of the doctors treating her. Libby had never liked Simon but is impressed with his dedication; unlucky in love herself, she’s drawn to him. Sparks fly, but their loyalty to Stella counters the attraction. Then the patient awakes, and, as can happen after comas, her personality is quite different. The old Stella was cautious and always played by the rules; the new one is restless, reckless, and emotionally distant. The only thing that calms her is art. Compulsive doodling turns into startlingly accomplished drawings—a talent she had never displayed before. People begin to commission her probing portraits; in the meantime, Simon, kicked out of his band because he stayed at Stella’s bedside, is a Lyft driver. And Libby keeps swearing she won’t see Simon anymore and then opening the door when he buzzes. Leavitt expands the characters with backstories that have a common thread: Stella, Simon, and Libby all felt severely rejected by their parents in childhood. The upheavals in their lives caused by Stella’s coma and its aftermath lead to the exposures of old secrets, healed wounds, and surprising futures.
One character’s coma is only the first surprise in this satisfying story of middle-aged love.Pub Date: Aug. 4, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-61620-779-3
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Algonquin
Review Posted Online: May 17, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2020
The emotions run high, the conversations run deep, and the relationships ebb and flow with grace.
When tragedy strikes, a mother and daughter forge a new life.
Morgan felt obligated to marry her high school sweetheart, Chris, when she got pregnant with their daughter, Clara. But she secretly got along much better with Chris’ thoughtful best friend, Jonah, who was dating her sister, Jenny. Now her life as a stay-at-home parent has left her feeling empty but not ungrateful for what she has. Jonah and Jenny eventually broke up, but years later they had a one-night stand and Jenny got pregnant with their son, Elijah. Now Jonah is back in town, engaged to Jenny, and working at the local high school as Clara’s teacher. Clara dreams of being an actress and has a crush on Miller, who plans to go to film school, but her father doesn't approve. It doesn’t help that Miller already has a jealous girlfriend who stalks him via text from college. But Clara and Morgan’s home life changes radically when Chris and Jenny are killed in an accident, revealing long-buried secrets and forcing Morgan to reevaluate the life she chose when early motherhood forced her hand. Feeling betrayed by the adults in her life, Clara marches forward, acting both responsible and rebellious as she navigates her teenage years without her father and her aunt, while Jonah and Morgan's relationship evolves in the wake of the accident. Front-loaded with drama, the story leaves plenty of room for the mother and daughter to unpack their feelings and decide what’s next.
The emotions run high, the conversations run deep, and the relationships ebb and flow with grace.Pub Date: Dec. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5420-1642-1
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2019
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.
Hannah’s new novel is an homage to the extraordinary courage and endurance of Frenchwomen during World War II.
In 1995, an elderly unnamed widow is moving into an Oregon nursing home on the urging of her controlling son, Julien, a surgeon. This trajectory is interrupted when she receives an invitation to return to France to attend a ceremony honoring passeurs: people who aided the escape of others during the war. Cut to spring, 1940: Viann has said goodbye to husband Antoine, who's off to hold the Maginot line against invading Germans. She returns to tending her small farm, Le Jardin, in the Loire Valley, teaching at the local school and coping with daughter Sophie’s adolescent rebellion. Soon, that world is upended: The Germans march into Paris and refugees flee south, overrunning Viann’s land. Her long-estranged younger sister, Isabelle, who has been kicked out of multiple convent schools, is sent to Le Jardin by Julien, their father in Paris, a drunken, decidedly unpaternal Great War veteran. As the depredations increase in the occupied zone—food rationing, systematic looting, and the billeting of a German officer, Capt. Beck, at Le Jardin—Isabelle’s outspokenness is a liability. She joins the Resistance, volunteering for dangerous duty: shepherding downed Allied airmen across the Pyrenees to Spain. Code-named the Nightingale, Isabelle will rescue many before she's captured. Meanwhile, Viann’s journey from passive to active resistance is less dramatic but no less wrenching. Hannah vividly demonstrates how the Nazis, through starvation, intimidation and barbarity both casual and calculated, demoralized the French, engineering a community collapse that enabled the deportations and deaths of more than 70,000 Jews. Hannah’s proven storytelling skills are ideally suited to depicting such cataclysmic events, but her tendency to sentimentalize undermines the gravitas of this tale.
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-312-57722-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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