Author: kim.harwanko

Summer of 1969

kim.harwanko

What goes through your mind when you think of the Summer of ’69 – free love, psychedelic drugs, Woodstock, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Charles Manson, Chappaquiddick, Vietnam, San Francisco and the moon landing-so many things.  I was too young to be anything other than an observer. But what a year it was.

Elin Hilderbrand takes us back to that turbulent time in her latest Nantucket read about the Foley/Levin family.  She explores the unique dynamics of families when life happens with all its unpredictability.

Kate’s son, Tiger, gets drafted out of high school.  She wants him to go to college and avoid the war, but he refuses and enlists and ends up in the thick of the fighting in Vietnam.  This starts Kate down a summer filled with remorse and alcohol. 

Kate, her children, Blair, Kirby, Tiger and Jessie and her second husband David spend the summers in Nantucket with Kate’s mother Exalta.  The name sure fits the person.  The story line follows these family members as they acclimated to the ever-changing events of the summer of 1969.

As the counter-war on the establishment rages and the young people burn draft cards protesting the Vietnam War, Kate’s family gets caught up in the upheaval.  Blair, Kate’s oldest is married and having twins. Her husband didn’t want her to continue her studies or work.  She’s miserable.

Tiger is fighting in the war. Kirby is working for the summer on Martha’s Vineyard and getting into her own mishaps as only a young person can. And Jessie, only 13, falls in love with a young man staying in the family’s home.  What could go wrong?

What we enjoyed in this novel was the family dynamic and how each member grew over that summer, some in small ways and others in leaps and bounds. It’s an easy and delightful read.  It was fun for us to talk about that summer (most of us were in middle school-some a little younger).  We talked about how that year was as magical as it was scary to us with all its mixed messages.  We also talked about how different it was for women in 1969 and how we need to continue to go forward – never to go back.

Rating: 7.5 Photo by NASA on Unsplash

As a side note:  Mary Jo Kopechne babysat me when I was a small child.  My grandparents lived across the street from the Kopechne’s in Berkeley Heights. When she was in high school, she would babysit my brother and me when our parents went out with our grandparents. I was very young and don’t have a good memory of her, a bit here and there. But I do remember seeing her parents when I visited my grandparents over the years. Mary Jo was their only child.

It’s such a small world.  

The Aftermath of War

kim.harwanko

Ever hear of Night Witches? Not the fictional kind. Real women doing unbelievable things. In WWII they were Russian fighter pilots and bombers. Who “…flew in outdated Polikarpov U-2s a cloth-and-plywood biplane with open-cockpits, achingly slow and highly flammable – no radio, parachute or brakes.”

Yup, that alone is worth the read. And we love these golden historical nuggets and The Huntress has plenty of them.

The characters in this wonderful book are instantly relatable. But the power of the story comes from Nina Borisovna, a night witch, and Die Jägerin, the Huntress.

Nina grew up desperately poor with an alcohol-infused maniac for a father in a remote place in northern Siberia. She escaped her father to become a pilot, normally not an easy task for a woman, but because of the war she was able to join the Night Witches, training first as a bombardier and later a pilot.

The Huntress grew up privileged in comparison to Nina, but that affluence didn’t stop her from actively and willingly lending her talents for hunting by tracking down and killing people for the glory of the Nazi-crazed killing machine. She feds six starving children then killed them.

Nina and the Huntress crossed paths at Lake Rusalka in Poland culminating in a deadly event.  Nina barely escaped and eventually teamed up with Ian Graham and Tony Rodomovsky after the war to find this deadly predator.

The novel crisscrosses time and point-of-view to bring layers of details and wonderful tension as the novel’s setting moves to Boston after the war and to the McBride family.  Jordan McBride, a 17-year-old novice photographer helps her father, Dan, with his antique business. Dan meets and marries Anneliese Weber, a war refugee.  During the small wedding, Jordan finds a swastika medal hidden in the bridal bouquet. Hmmm…what could that mean?

Ian Graham and Tony Rodomovsky are looking for justice.  Ian, a journalist and Tony, a solider and linguist, passionately hunt down war criminals for there own personal reasons.  Nina is hell-bent on revenge.

As a book club we enjoyed this novel. We learned things about the war that we didn’t previously know. We had already read The Nightingale and wondered if this would be more of the same.  But both books are quite different and both great reads.

We talked about revenge and justice. How emotion rules revenge and how justice needs to be impartial. And we talked about survivaling war and its aftermath.

Definitely a good book for book clubs.

Rating: 8.5

Photo Credit: Elinor Florence; www.elinorflorence.com

Stealing Babies

kim.harwanko

Throughout history children have often been abused and killed at the hands of adults who should be there to help and support them. This novel brings us back to the 1930’s through the present following a fictional family and the horrific historical incidents surrounding an orphanage. Evil is interlaced with goodness as we see this gracefully told story unfold.

Lisa Wingate takes us back to 1939 on the Mississippi River in “Before We Were Yours.” Parents, Queenie and Briny have five children.  Queenie is pregnant with twins and can’t deliver the babies with a midwife.  Briny makes the decision to leave with Queenie to take her to a hospital.  What happens after that is such a miscarriage of justice that it’s hard to imagine that this actually happened to children in America. 

Wingate drew from the infamous Georgia Tann and her wretched Tennessee Children’s Home Society in Memphis.

Queenie and Briny’s high-spirited children left on a boat in the Mississippi River while their parents leave for the hospital. They are quite poor without any resources. Rill, Camiella, Lark, Fern and Gabion are taken by the police and put into the Tennessee Children’s Home. 

Fast forward to the present, Avery Stafford, a young lawyer, working with her father’s senatorial campaign has a chance encounter with May Crandall at a nursing home, her father happens to be speaking at.  This meeting set into motion a chain of events that would change all their lives forever.

This book has to be read without a lot of information given out beforehand. Wingate wrote a story with a lot of small moments that all become one large one and the reader should see it unfold the way it’s supposed to.

Our book club loved this book.  It’s quite sad at parts, and we may have glossed over a few things we felt too bad about. The book manages to end on a high note, but it stayed with me for days. I can’t fathom hurting a child.  It goes so against everything I believe in.

We talked about the children and the how their lives unfolded. Also, about the other children that no one seems to know about. So many of them were never found. We talked about motherhood and what that really means – biological and adoptive.

Every book club should read this book.

(There are quite a few non-fiction books on the subject that Wingate offers at the end of her novel if you want to continue reading on this subject.)

Enjoy.

Rating: 9 fffffffff

Little Fires Everywhere

kim.harwanko

“…she was standing on the tree lawn in her robe and a pair of her son Trip’s tennis shoes, watching their house burn to the ground.” 

Now there’s an opening for you.

Set in the idyllic town of Shaker Heights, Ohio, whose residents basically crafted their own little utopia. They carefully planned a community designed to reflect their values. But utopia’s seemingly perfect setting stems from a set of rules and conditions.

Enter the disruptors Mia Warren and her 15-year-old daughter, Pearl. The story weaves a tale of the long-time residents, the Richardsons and the newcomers, the Warrens.  Elena Richardson rented the Warrens a home she owned in town.  Pearl Warren became friends with the Richardson children, and even dates one of them. The two families become even more entwined when Mia Warren becomes a part-time housekeeper for the Richardsons. 

The Warrens and Richardsons have two distinct ideologies and as the story develops you can feel the conflict swirling around even before the catalyst arrives on the scene, an infant baby girl abandoned at the local fire station.

We read this book for our April book club and most of the members enjoyed the novel. Unlike many reviews of the book, we didn’t find that the race issue, a Chinese baby being adopted by an American couple, the McCulloughs, was the main topic of the story.  We all felt that the story was about clashing family values and what happens when everyone is shouting, but no is listening. We did discuss the adoption of a Chinese baby to a white family, but really felt the story lay at the feet of Elena Richardson and Mia Warren. 

It’s so easy to judge other people and find fault in their morals and values. But sometimes you need to open your own ears and really listen.  Sometimes you’re not as far apart as you think.

Let it be….

Rating: 8.0

Lying, cheating, private jets and tons of money – what more could you ask for!

kim.harwanko

The Last Mrs. Parrish

As winter begins its climb up north it never seems to leave quietly for its summer home. Instead it kicks and moans leaving snow and rain and wind in its wake. We in New Jersey are weary of winter and want nothing more than warm temperatures and sunny skies. So, we tend to pick saucier reads in March – anything for a little warmth.

This month we picked The Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine.

The novel opens in Amber Patterson point of view. As the reader you want to empathize with the protagonist and reading through the first half of the book you simply can’t with this awful person. You continue to read because you know something must be coming.  Well, welcome to this psychological suspense novel, where all is not what it seems.

Amber manipulates her way into Daphne Parrish’s life with the guise of grieving for a dead sister. Daphne lost her sister to a devastating disease and is a board member of a charitable organization tasked to raising money to find a cure.  Amber joins the organization claiming she also lost her sister to the same illness.  Daphne takes her under her wing and the two bond over their shared grief.

Designer clothes, private jets and loads of money attract all sorts of types. Amber’s a long way from her impoverished roots in Missouri but she has learned from her previous mistakes and greedily takes on the privileged class of Long Island Sound.  As Amber gets closer and closer inside the Parrish family, she seems unstoppable.

The second half of the book is in Daphne’s point of view. I was so disgusted with Amber’s character by the time I got to the second half of the book that I almost put the book down. Don’t keep reading. Daphne’s character will keep you vested in the book.  There is another central character that I’ll let the reader discover for themselves.  Note: he made my skin crawl. This is one of those books that you can’t divulge too much without giving away the story.

For the most part, our book club liked this book. Amber got no sympathy from us. We were all rooting for Daphne.  We talked about how women can help other women.  We had a long discussion about about psychological abuse and how it evolves over time and what can be done about it.  

This saucy read certainly warmed up our March.

Last word: Without giving anything away, I would never taunt a sociopath – just sayin.

Rating: 7.5

Photo by Ross Sneddon on Unsplash

Fiddle de dee

kim.harwanko

One of the first movies I ever saw with my family was Gone With the Wind.  My first movie was more age-appropriate by today’s standards – Bambi. But back in the 1960’s we didn’t have Disney Studios and Pixar, etc. pumping out tons of children’s movies per year. So, when the family wanted to see a movie maybe once every six months, my father usually decided. A favorite of his was Gone With the Wind.  I think I was around 10 years old when we first went to the local drive-in theater that showed classic movies from time to time.

As a young girl, Scarlett O’Hara was everything I thought was important at the time. She was beautiful, popular, well-dressed and the boys and men loved her, even fought over her. Her resilience was unstoppable in all the adversity she faced later in the movie.  As I grew older, Scarlett’s shortcomings were more evident. But she remains a compelling character to me.  I’m still drawn to her.

What I had never done was read the book.  Why? I had watched the movie so many times I couldn’t imagine the book keeping my attention.  Well, I was so wrong. Not only did it keep my attention it filled in so many details that the movie couldn’t. I loved it.

We read the book for our February book club.

The movie and book place the reader in the South during the Civil War. It gives us a Southern view of life with all its beauty and then the horror of the war. We view the destruction of the South during the war and the Reconstruction afterward through the eyes of Scarlett O’Hara.  Once a flighty young debutante without a care in the world to a starved young woman fighting for food. Vowing to never go hungry again, she turns herself into a steeled competitor in a man’s world violating her Southern conventions way before Gloria Steinem and the women’s movement in the 1960’s and 70’s.

The book rounds out Scarlett’s character better than the movie does. You empathize with Scarlett more even if you don’t quite agree with her actions.

In book club we talked about how Scarlett reacted to various situations, like stealing her sister’s finance. Her fierce determination and how it changed her. We also talked about how different sides of a situation view things and, of course, would Scarlett and Rhett get back together.

Our book club tries to read a classic book every year. Why – when most of us have read them before? Because we are reading them at an older, more experience stage in our lives and it’s amazing how different we see these now.

Enjoy!

Rating: 9.5

Photo by Ian Wagg on Unsplash 11ae1000

Friends and Books Does it Get Any Better

kim.harwanko


Photo by NordWood Themes on Unsplash

Here we are in 2019!  We braved frigid temperatures last night for our first book club this year. And what a book club it was! Twelve of us squeezed around an elongated table laughing, eating, drinking and catching up – our usual MO.

By the time we turned our attention to January’s book selection we were jazzed up and ready for discussion. Our pick was “Amanda Wakes Up,” by Alisyn Camerota, the CNN New Day cohost.

Although many news show hosts have written books, Camerota’s “Amanda Wakes Up,” is distinctly different from the pack. It’s a fictional story of a young idealistic journalist landing her dream job very early in her career.

Benji Diggs, the “master of mass media,” hires Amanda as a cohost for his new morning show Wake Up, USA, after she scoops a story by being the first on scene at a hostage situation (without pants).  Diggs’ FAIR News Network intends to “dissolve the left-right paradigm,” and present both sides of every story. Amanda loves the idea of being fair. After all it’s what the journalist’s creed is all about – clear thinking, clear statement, accuracy, fairness and truth.

As the story progresses and the stakes rise for Amanda, she is forced to take stock of what is important to her and what she believes in. The tension rises when pressure mounts from Diggs, her boyfriend, and her friends and family that she conform to their way of thinking. She does the best she can to adapt until…one person makes her look deep within. What path will she take – will her integrity bloom or will ambition win?

(more…)

Christmas 2018

kim.harwanko

The holidays are a wonderful time to get together. We don’t assign a book in December, everyone is too busy. But we make time to get together. We had a lot to be grateful for this year with the release of our book Novel Women.  And our appearance on CNN! I wanted to thank those special women with a little token of my appreciation.

Try to join a book club if you don’t belong to one. It’s so rewarding and you meet some amazing women along the way.

One of the authors, Denise Panyik-Dale, has many talents, not only does she write but she’s a wonderful photographer. You can get some of the following pictures at Getty.

Happy New Year to all!

Fran and I enjoying a moment!

A touch of Heaven before the holidays

kim.harwanko

Our last book of the year was Mitch Albom’s The Next Person You Meet in Heaven.

Most of us had read Albom’s first book The Five People You Meet in Heaven, and we thought it would be a great book to finish the year on. The sequel picks up with Annie, the young girl who Eddie saved with his own life at the amusement park where he worked.

Annie’s life story isn’t pretty. And her hardships and her desire to find love and acceptance are sad. She’s bullied about her mangled hand, and at every corner she faces another challenge that she steadfastly deals with. But she does find love and is very happy until…

Ron Charles, Critic for Book World wrote in his critique for The Washington Post, “That this sportswriter should become our national correspondent on the afterlife is perhaps the best proof we have that God works in mysterious ways. But America has always been thirsty for sugary elixirs of spirituality diluted in platitudes. We are truly people touched by an angel — or at least by its dust.” Charles isn’t a fan.

Our book club saw the sentimentality in the book, but the book gave us a chance to talk about religion. One of the three no’s for polite conversation. After our book club appeared on CNN on their voter panels before the midterm election, religion didn’t scare us so much anymore.

Politics was definitely a strained conversation in comparison to religion. We talked about our beliefs. Whether we believe in heaven, hell and the afterlife. The majority of book club is Christian with one Atheist and one Agnostic thrown in to make it a little more interesting. You would think that everyone’s viewpoint would be similar, but that wasn’t the case. Some of the ladies read bibles daily, go to church a few times a week, and even go to religious retreats. Some only attend church on the holidays, but they do believe in a higher power. There were a few raised eyes and a few “are you kidding,” but for the most part we have it enlightening.

Albom believes every life matters and so do we. The book will create some good discussions in book club, as long as you listen without judging another’s belief because you may learn something new or a different take on something. I’d say it open my eyes a bit in a surprising and wonderful way.


Photo by Davide Cantelli on Unsplash

Welcome October – Such a Beautiful Month

kim.harwanko

Since October is such an extraordinary month we had to pick an equally amazing book.  And we did – “Ordinary Grace,” by William Kent Kruger.

“When my mother finally sang it was not just a hymn she offered, it was consummate comfort. She sang slowly and richly and delivered the heart of that great spiritual [‘Swing Low, Sweet Chariot’] as if she was delivering heaven itself and her face was beautiful and full of peace. I shut my eyes and her voice reached out to wipe away my tears and enfold my heart . . . And when she finished the sound of the breeze through the doorway was like the sigh of angels well pleased.” Pure nirvana!

Death visited the small Minnesota town of New Bremen in many forms one summer and it shaped the lives of the protagonist, Frank and his entire family. This is Frank’s coming of age story and he tells it as an adult looking back forty years. The story is filtered now with his years of experience.

At the time of the story, Frank’s father was a local minister, his mother was the choir director, his sister had just been accepted to Julliard, and his younger brother, Jake, was his side-kick and suffered from a severe stutter. This ordinary summer started out with a tragedy for one family.  That tragedy seemed to bring a string of bad karma for some other townspeople before landing at Frank’s family’s door.

The characters of this story, including Emil Brandt and his sister, Lise, vividly depict small-town America in the 1960’s including all the wonderful details of the era.

After tragedy strikes Frank’s family this story could have turned very melancholy. However, the story finds a surprising strength – it keeps its hope. In the end Frank and his family find a way to go on, to go forward. A good lesson for all of us.

We loved this book and highly recommend it to everyone.  Book clubs can talk about marriage, parenting, and childhood. How our youthful experiences shape our adult live.

One of the things I really loved in this book is how richly flawed the parents are, especially the mother. But we are drawn to her. We know her dreams and her fears. We want her to find happiness. There are profound lessons in this novel for all of us.

There’s a very good pod cast with the author, William Kurt Kruger.  I recommend that book clubs listen to it. We did and everyone enjoyed it.

Rating: 9.0

Before book club we signed our book Novel Women!

The authors enjoying a class of wine!