One thing is for certain: the GIANT stack of books on my desk is not going to read itself! I am trying to carve out a little bit of time each day to read — it’s the only thing keeping me sane during self-isolation.
Well, I guess it’s not the only thing, but certainly anything “bookish” is helping me. I have been attending weekly online author events and they are a lot of fun, but also are making my TBR list longer and longer.
About six weeks ago, one of these online events was an interview with Brit Bennett, because it was pub day for her second novel “The Vanishing Half“. I thought she was so cool and she talked a little bit about her first novel, “The Mothers” and it sounded so good.
Which brings us to today, because I’ve finished reading it and Blanche’s Book Club is thrilled to have it as a part of our intense summer reading program 🙂
Here’s the book description:
Set within a contemporary black community in Southern California, Brit Bennett’s mesmerizing first novel is an emotionally perceptive story about community, love, and ambition. It begins with a secret.
“All good secrets have a taste before you tell them, and if we’d taken a moment to swish this one around our mouths, we might have noticed the sourness of an unripe secret, plucked too soon, stolen and passed around before its season.”
It is the last season of high school life for Nadia Turner, a rebellious, grief-stricken, seventeen-year- old beauty. Mourning her own mother’s recent suicide, she takes up with the local pastor’s son. Luke Sheppard is twenty-one, a former football star whose injury has reduced him to waiting tables at a diner. They are young; it’s not serious. But the pregnancy that results from this teen romance—and the subsequent cover-up—will have an impact that goes far beyond their youth. As Nadia hides her secret from everyone, including Aubrey, her God-fearing best friend, the years move quickly. Soon, Nadia, Luke, and Aubrey are full-fledged adults and still living in debt to the choices they made that one seaside summer, caught in a love triangle they must carefully maneuver, and dogged by the constant, nagging question: What if they had chosen differently? The possibilities of the road not taken are a relentless haunt.
In entrancing, lyrical prose, The Mothers asks whether a “what if” can be more powerful than an experience itself. If, as time passes, we must always live in servitude to the decisions of our younger selves, to the communities that have parented us, and to the decisions we make that shape our lives forever.
If you cannot guess from the description, this book was juicy and FULL of small-town church gossip… what is better than that? There was surprisingly a lot in this book I could relate to, and it was very well-written.
This is honestly probably not a book I would have normally picked up, but I’m so glad I did! I’d definitely recommend this one, especially if you’re trying to diversify your reading list.
The next book Blanche’s Book Club will be reading is “The Jetsetters” by Amanda Eyre Ward.
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