Jane Mundy (2)

What a good book this is. I just selected it almost-at-random from the library shelves and it's turned out to be a real winner! The author obviously really understands people and used that understanding to set up believable and interesting characters. As with many authors, I wonder how much of her own experience is embodied in her character (the father of the protagonist) who is a writer (by passion, if not by success and income). About that character her protagonist says: "He was utterly driven. Writing is a terrible thing, the most viciously solitary of pursuits. Someone who is a writer is tossed about. Perhaps it is not possible to be a writer, I concluded, and be at peace."

But this is much more than a story of that frustrated and restless writer. It's a story of father-daughter relationships, mother-son relationships, the war in Vietnam and the antiwar movement, hoarding and disposing, death and grieving, guilt and forgiveness. What more can you want from a book?… (mer)