“Cabrini” is a 2024 biographical drama directed by Alejandro Monteverde, chronicling the life of Francesca Cabrini, an Italian immigrant nun who became the first American citizen to be canonized as a saint. Set in late 19th-century New York City, the film portrays Cabrini’s unwavering dedication to aiding impoverished Italian immigrants, particularly orphaned children, amidst societal challenges.
Cristiana Dell’Anna delivers a compelling performance as Cabrini, capturing her resilience and compassion. The film’s cinematography effectively evokes the era’s atmosphere, immersing viewers in the historical context.
Although, critics have offered mixed reviews; RogerEbert.com praised it as a “dignified” portrayal that honors Cabrini’s efforts, while IndieWire criticized it as “stodgy” and “histrionic.” Our book club thoroughly enjoyed the movie. We felt that the movie offered an insightful look into the life of a remarkable woman whose legacy of charity and perseverance continues to inspire. All of us were inspired. It was amazing to us how much she accomplished with all those obstacles thrown at her. A truly remarkable women.
Alice Hoffman’s The Marriage of Opposites is an evocative novel inspired by the life of Rachel Pizzarro, the mother of the renowned Impressionist painter Camille Pissarro. Set on the Caribbean island of St. Thomas in the early 19th century, the book weaves themes of love, rebellion, and art into a tapestry of cultural and historical intrigue.
Rachel, a strong-willed and passionate woman, defies societal expectations through her forbidden romance with her late husband’s nephew, Frédérick. Their love story is both a source of scandal and a testament to resilience, mirroring the novel’s broader exploration of identity, family, and creativity. Hoffman’s prose is richly descriptive, bringing the island’s landscapes and the complexities of its diverse communities vividly to life.
Through Rachel’s story, Hoffman examines the sacrifices and freedoms of defying convention while tracing the roots of artistic inspiration. The novel is a compelling blend of history and magical realism, offering a portrait of a woman whose indomitable spirit paved the way for her son’s artistic legacy.
Our book club was mixed on this novel. Some thought it was an enchanting tale with a dynamic female character and others didn’t care for Rachel. We discussed how societal expectations weigh heavy on people who live their life their way and damn with the consequences.
Shelby Van Pelt’s novel Remarkably Bright Creatures is a story about healing and finding love again.
After her husband dies, Tova Sullivan works keeping her home in tip-top shape and takes a job at Puget Sound’s Sowell Bay Aquarium cleaning and talking with the creatures of the sea. Her favorite is an octopus named Marcellus. Staying busy helps quiet the 70-year-old’s mind from wondering about her son, Erik, who died at eighteen from suicide. Tova never believed the coroner’s ruling.
Her friends don’t understand why she mops floors at the aquarium when she has plenty of money. Tova has a steely determination to live her life her way and on her own. She even refuses all offers of help when she decides to downsize from her childhood home.
The novel keys in on another character, Cameron. A thirty something, down-on-his-luck young man looking to find his father and get money for all the child support payments never made to his mother. His mother suffered from mental illness and left Cameron with her sister to raise. Abandoned, Cameron can’t get his act together. Without a stable family, his ability to form secure attachments always falters and his relationships fall apart. Frustrated about his life, he leaves his hometown to find his father from a picture he found in his mother’s belongings. Cameron arrives in Tova’s town – coincidental?
Love – it’s what we all crave. It doesn’t always come in the Prince Charming package. And slowly, Tova Sullivan, let the pain of her incredible losses subside and allowed moments of affection, caring and love back into your life.
And let’s not forget about Marcellus – the octopus. If you happened to listen to the book, the narrator was amazing. Everyone at my book club loved this character.
We genuinely enjoyed this book. It’s a feel-good-happy book and it’s always nice to have a smile on your face when you finish a novel. We discussed the general theme of the book – healing. Everyone has people they loved who have passed away and the difficulty of grieving. The deeper the love you have for someone – the longer the time you will mourn them according to a grief counselor I spoke with. We also discussed love of family and friends and the great comfort they can bring.
Our book club was honored this month to host author, Mally Becker, and her new book – The Turncoat’s Widow: A Revolutionary War Mystery.
We so enjoyed reading her book that we were thrilled to be able to ask her questions about where she came up with the idea for a strong female lead in America’s revolutionary war. The seed of the story came about when Mally was looking through Morristown National Historical Park archival letters and she found a copy of an indictment for the crime of traveling from NJ to NY without permission or passport.
So began her writing journey. And we were so glad she did.
The story begins with the death of the Philip Parcell. He had been held prisoner and was tortured by the British who were looking for a list of informants. Before his death, he told a fellow prisoner (Daniel) to contact his wife, Rebecca and have her sell the list to General Washington.
Daniel escapes and goes in search of Rebecca. All is not well for her at home. She struggles to maintain their farm and must deal with hostile townspeople who think she’s a turncoat and threaten to take her farm away. She has wanted nothing to do with this war but finds herself square in the middle of it by the time Daniel finds Rebecca. Washington tasks both with finding the list. In turn, he will safeguard her farm and grant it to her if she prevails.
There’s a lot going on in this novel but it’s an exciting read with believable and interesting characters throughout. Plus, we all learned a bunch of things about women in that time period and about the war itself. Well researched. Your book club will love it.
Covid and crawdads – who would have thought of any connection between them. But this month our book club pick seemed so appropriate. Isolation was a theme we all understood after this long, fearful year.
Now imagine you’re a young girl and all alone. No one to love and nurture you. One by one Kya’s family left home. First, at age six, her mother. Followed by her siblings and finally her drunken father. She had to prevail over unbelievable odds from an incredibly young age.
Kya’s coming-of-age story takes place in the marshes of North Carolina. Imagine the loneliness of a 10-year-old girl living by herself. Shunned by the locals who nicknamed her “marsh girl,” she learns to take care of herself. Kya is helped by a few people like Jumini, his wife and a young man named Tate.
Her story of survival coincides with an investigation into the untimely death of Chase Andrews, a married man, who had dated Kya. The authorities and Chase’s mother are convinced that he was murdered. The story twists and turns like traversing the backwaters of the North Carolina’s marshes. Some of our members guessed the end and others were shocked by it.
A lot of controversary surrounds the book – critics abound. It is a bit unbelievable but so what. Delia Owens writes so lyrically about the marshes that I wanted to visit and that’s definitely not something I ever wanted to do.
Our book club liked the book, and we had some good discussions regarding the setting and the time period (the book was set in late 1950-1960’s). And, of course, the ending, which I don’t want to spoil here. It’s a good discussion book for book clubs.
Harlan Coben crafts another captivating mystery with The Boy from the Woods. His novels are enjoyed by our entire book club. And he’s a Jersey boy – always a plus.
The protagonist of Coben’s latest whodunit is Wilde who thirty years earlier was found in the woods of New Jersey. In a throwback to Tarzan, he had been living like a wild animal and had no memory of where he came from or what his name was. The townspeople called him Wilde.
Fast forward to present and he is asked by Hester Crimstein, a criminal TV attorney, to probe into the disappearance of a teenage girl named Naomi Pine, a friend of her grandson. Wilde is a security expert with unique abilities to investigate and solve difficult cases. His is also a friend of Hester and her family.
Nothing’s as it seems in the search for the missing teenager. But what fun would it be if it were.
Coben’s books don’t usually lend themselves to intense discussion. However, we love to talk about the twists and turns and who saw what coming and so on. Mysteries are so much fun.
We all agreed at book club that we wanted Wilde to search for his parents/relatives. Who the hell left a young boy in the woods? That to us was the biggest secret of all. Maybe there’s a second book being planned for Wilde and we’ll get our answer then.
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.)
Michelle graciously hosted book club this month. It was a smaller group, but a lively one.
Our book was “Life Expectancy,” by Dean Koontz. Yup, that’s right, Dean Koontz. A horror writer for a book club selection! You bet! Just like Stephen King, Koontz can write anything, and most importantly he keeps the tension up all the way through the novel.
A friend recommended this book to me, but I wasn’t sure that our book club would like a Koontz novel. I love him, especially the Odd Thomas series, but would my fellow book clubbites also enjoy the book. I took a chance, it was after all close to Halloween. All fears were gone when we started the discussion, everyone loved the book.
I have a review of the book under Reviews to the right. Take a chance and do this book for a book club pick – you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Boo!
courtesy of Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau
Our October meeting was quite small, so I saved the book “Reading in the Dark,” by Seamus Deane for November’s meeting.
I read Tom Wolfe’s latest novel “Back to Blood.” I have a review under Reviews on the right for book clubs. I always enjoy reading a Wolfe novel because he is such a unique voice in the literary world. I remember reading “Bonfire of the Vanities,” back in the 1980’s, and my boss at the time said he couldn’t finish it, that all people are not that evil. I did finish the novel and read his subsequent works.
When I read a Wolfe novel, I don’t read for the characters, but for that moment in time that Wolfe deems relevant to our microcosm here in the US. His characters lack dimension and I rarely find myself rooting for one, but he has a way of developing the story and pushing us along with it. He shows us a few snapshots of the microcosm and interprets it as only Wolfe can do.