City of a Thousand Gates: A Novel

I'm not even sure where to begin with when writing my review of City of a Thousand Gates: A Novel by Rebecca Sacks. Rather than struggle to summarize the novel while not giving anything away, I suggest you read the review from The Washington Post that does a far better job than I could ever do.

City of a Thousand Gates is the selection we will discuss at my January synagogue book club meeting. It's really a raw look at the Israeli-Palestinian crisis in Jerusalem - and, well, Israel. The lack of peace between the two groups is raw so why shouldn't the novel be also. To be totally upfront here, I love Israel. I loved my time spent in Israel and I would love to go back. I definitely understand why the Jews view Israel as the refuge that it has been for many over time. However, I am conflicted by the human rights violations that are part of the everyday lives of the Palestinians. Why can't everyone just get along? This novel gave me more perspective on why people can't even attempt to get along. The history between the Israelis and Palestinians have such a history of not getting along. 

This novel confirms my conflicted feelings. It helped me understand the viewpoints of the different groups. Those born in Israel, those who came to Israel after running away from a bad situation in Europe. New immigrants. Palestinians whose families have been there forever. Some of them living in the West Bank. Some of them living in East Jerusalem. So many different personalities and experiences and perceptions of the situation.

The contentious environment sits on top of the normal everyday life for everyone who lives there. The characters have their own lives, complete with regular issues like everyone else, and then the "war" going on around them which is ever present. I can't imagine living life like that.

I look forward to discussing with my group.

The Alice Network

I think what I found most fascinating about The Alice Network was that it seamlessly blends stories about World War I and World War II. The story is told in two different timelines, from two different character's points-of-view.

Eve's story is told mostly about her experience as a female spy in occupied France during World War I. Charlie's story takes place shortly after the end of World War II. Charlie is a young, unwed, pregnant woman in Europe with her mother so she can get an abortion, something which is illegal in the United States at that time. She decides almost on a whim to search for her French cousin, Rose, who went missing towards the end of World War II. After fighting with her mother, she heads off to London in search of a woman who might have some connection to Rose. That woman is Eve. Most of the Charlie chapters are about Charlie, Eve, and Eve's Scottish driver, Finn, driving around France looking for any clues about where Rose might be.

As I was reading, I realized that most of the novel was based on historical events, but it wasn't until I was done reading the story and was reading the notes afterwards that I realized how much of the story was very closely based to actual events. The Alice Network is a book that pulled me right in and kept me interested until the end. I look forward to my book club discussion this afternoon.
 

Oh William!

I'm not sure why the rush to read thru all the Elizabeth Strout novels in the Amgash Series which started with My Name is Lucy Barton. Oh William! is the third in the series. (I've got Lucy by the Sea on hold at the library. The wait is fairly long.)

Oh William! picks up the story after years when Lucy and William have been divorced a long time. William is on his third wife and Lucy's second husband has recently died. I guess I was sort of confounded as to how - or why - Lucy and William maintained the relationship that they still have after all these years. But that's part of my personal perspective and my history with my ex-husband. Lucy does explain it several times by saying that William always made her feel safe and sort of grounded. 

As Lucy is now alone, she has more time to think about William's other relationships and the marriages that her daughters are in. She also thinks a lot about William's mother, Catherine. In the novel, we get to learn a lot more about Catherine's history: who she was before she became William's mother. Really, what do we know of our parents before they were our parents? And how often do we really think about them in that way?

Of the three books in the series that I've read so far, I definitely connected much more to Oh William! than the other two. Perhaps because in the novel, Lucy is nearly my age. She's dealing with an (long ago) divorce, an ex-husband, adult daughters with struggles of their own. Oh William! was an enjoyable follow-up to My Name is Lucy Barton and Anything is Possible. Now I'll just sit patiently here, reading other things, while I wait for Lucy by the Sea.
 

Mad Honey

Mad Honey, a collaborative writing effort of Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan, is a difficult novel to write about without giving too much away. In fact, I thought long and hard about which labels I wanted to use in describing this post. In the end, I decided that less is more.

Like almost all Picoult novels, this one, Mad Honey, is based on current events, involves a bunch of courtroom scenes and meetings with lawyers, and has a twist somewhere in the story to make you realize at that point that the novel isn't going in the direction you thought it was headed.

The two authors worked very well together. Seaminglessly.The story was told in two voices, from two perspectives. Olivia, the single mom of Asher, and Lily, Asher's girlfriend. I imagined that one author was responsible for writing Olivia's chapters and the other for Lily's chapters. That wasn't exactly the case. Boylan came up with the idea for the novel and Picoult jumped right aboard. 

I wasn't always happy with the trajectory of the plot. I thought the novel dragged in places and was too rushed in others. I wasn't totally satisfied with how some of the subplots were wrapped up. Yet I would still highly recommend this novel. Why? Because it's so informative about current issues. And while these issues surely don't impact everyone directly, they do - or should - impact everyone indirectly. It's important to know about these issues in an attempt to understand and be accepting of others whose life experiences are not like yours. Plus, it was interesting to learn about beekeeping and honey. I knew some of the facts offered about honey but certainly not all. (Yes, I do love honey. And I really appreciated the honey recipes at the end of the book. I wish I baked. I'd be making up a honey loaf right now!)