E Stout's TELL ME EVERTHING-Everything Stouts Writes Shouts to be Read and Savored

Elizabeth Stout is an American literary novelist whose novels are a continuous tale of characters whose lives overlap in her prolific collection of books set in the fictional small town of Shirley Falls, ME with Lucy Barton, a successful novelist at their fulcrum. Stout is a critically acclaimed, best selling author. Her previous novel "Olive Kitteridge" (K) won the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. In K, Stout strung together a series of loosely entwined short stories that meshed together into a richly, descriptive novel of a town and its sundry inhabitants. The motifs running through "Tell Me Everything" are Stout's common memes of loneliness or need for being seen, love in all its various forms constitutes love, and the meaning of life remains an eternal enigma. The overriding message is that everyone's life is a story worthy of being told. These recurring themes may seem trite or banal, but in Stout's skillful hands, crafts a beguiling tale of grace and intrigue. All Stout's characters and the town itself come alive with her sharp descriptions and use of humor, emotions and behaviors. The people are all fallible, remarkable and likable. Lucy Barton, now middle-aged with two grown daughters, granddaughter and ex-husband (with whom she resides) has defied the constraints of a bleak and abysmal childhood and still managed to achieve success as a writer. She distanced herself from the shackles of Shirley Falls and chose to return home. Lucy reconnects with her old steadfast friend, Bob Burgess. Burgess is an attorney, married to the town's parishioner, Margaret. Margaret likes the sound of her own sermons a tad too much. William, Lucy's ex, drones on too much about his boring field; parasites. And, old Olive Kitteridge, feisty as ever at 95, is still a sounding board for others' stories; especially Lucy's. There's assorted loco, locals who imbibe too much, have illicit affairs with friends' spouses and those putting noses inside others' houses. Plus, there's more with a murder mystery to solve. The prime suspect is an oddball loner who becomes Burgess' client. Lucy and Bob take regular strolls together in all kinds of weather while friends and lovers fall from favor. Out of all Stout's exceptional novels, TELL ME EVERYTHING contains everyone from her past literary works. In this ambitious and gratifying read, everything eventually tugs at the heartstrings. Stout satisfies loose ends in her character's lives. so it seems. Still, life is full of surprises. Surely, Stout will provide us with more from the lives of Lucy and her Shirley Falls' family. Hopefully! Stout leaves us with Lucy saying to Olive, "Love comes in so many different forms, but it is always love. If it is love, then it is love." 

WIN ME SOMETHING-Something Special in this Millennial Coming of Age Novel in NYC

Lusica Wu's debut novel, WIN ME SOMETHING (WMS) is a captivating tale about a 24 year old college graduate, Willa Chen, who finds herself at odds and lands a nanny job for a wealthy couple living in NYS's trendy Tribeca neighborhood. Willa is the only child from the marriage of a Caucasian mother and Asian father which leaves her floundering to find roots. She's distanced from both parents who've moved on to second marriages and more children. The name Willa translates to strong-willed warrior or desire. Our young heroine, while not strong willed, is resolute in her pursuit to forge connections having grown up feeling very much alone. As she puts it,  "in my solitary world...I don't know what it's like to be in a family." Willa wins the reader over by not being pitiful despite being lonely. We admire her unflappability and willingness to open herself up to form attachments. After graduating, Willa worked nights as a bartender and wanted to try something during daytime hours. She finds working for a rich couple caring for their precocious 9-year old daughter, Bijou, as a live-in nanny. The relationship between Willa and Bijou moves the story along with zest and warmth. Bijou's packed schedule is filled with enrichment classes of ballet, violin, mandarin etc. Bijou is also a budding chef whose culinary skills are encouraged at home. WMS does give a fun peek inside the extravagant lifestyle of NYC's rich and parodies some of their snobbish behaviors. However, the main focus is Willa's quest for any port in a storm.  As much as she'd like to be accepted as a member of Bijou's family she will also always remain an outsider to them and to others remain at a distance being bi-racial and of two disjointed families.  Wu's debut novel traverses Willa's childhood and back to the present through Willa's keen understanding of  herself being on the sidelines. In truth, neither her parents or Bijou's parents are cruel or heartless, but neither provides the nurturing Willa craves.Throughout, Willa retains a pragmatic understanding of herself and a sense of humor which lends enjoyment to this clever and delightful read. Besides being geared for millennials, there are universal themes of feeling listless and unanchored in Wu's winning debut novel. Willa's father confides that her younger sisters are too coddled and tells her,"You were never like that, picky, or afraid. I know you can handle life. You're tough."  We agree with that assessment which we've perceived all along. Willa maintains our affection with her desire and to fit in and our admiration for her self-realization. At a party of wealthy, young urbanites Willa observed the other sophisticated women and admits, "I watched all this and I tried to do it, but it never worked for me. Everyone knew I was pretending to be someone else...But I didn't feel the way I used to-that I'd give anything to become one of them. They'd see through me, and that was worse. I would have to be myself." 

WEST with GIRAFFES-Historic Fiction-Old Fashioned Story Telling that Feels Stifling

Lynda Rutledge's novel is part coming of age story set during the era of the Great Dust Bowl based on the true story of the first giraffes to be transported from Africa across the Atlantic and then transported to San Diego across country. Rutledge's research mirrors very closely the epic journey cross the US continent to the San Diego Zoo. There's many moving parts to this tall tale written in the style of a dated black/white movie depicting the fallouts from both the Great Dust Bowl and Great Depression. Furthermore, there is the interesting historical figure, Belle Benchley, the first female zoo director in the world who oversaw the entire operation for 26 years becoming known for advocating for the protection of wildlife. Despite the extraordinary elements from an epoch in our nation's history, the novel's archaic storytelling is so arid and musty it's not worth the time spent reading. Woodrow Wilson, "Woody" is the novel's protagonist whose  parents and younger sister both perish on their dried up farm in TX leaving him orphaned and nearly penniless. He takes to the rails like many other hobos scrounging to find work, food and shelter. Woody went from the Great Dust Bowl into the Great New England Hurricane of 1938 which impacted the ship carrying the pair of giraffes purchased for the zoo. So many great disasters to fabricate a fascinating story and Rutledge panders her material with Woody's cheesy infatuation with a red headed older woman and his abject alliance to the "old man" who unwillingly resigns to hiring him to help drive the truck transporting the two giraffes. The saga which takes them through the segregated south, and through the ravaged countryside. Unfortunately, Rutledge reduces the novel to a rudimentary yarn with stock stereotypes of your grumpy old man with a soft heart and a wild redheaded ingenue with a sickly heart who wants to have one last adventure. Woody's woes are alluded to and the revealed admission to the old man is a mawkish payoff of regret for a tragedy not of his making. What I did find refreshing were the interactions between the giraffes and their givers. The exotic creatures were endearing and their welfare was the heart of the novel that never embraced the essence of what Belle Benchley or someone like Jane Goodall have dedicated their lives to. The novel is structured around Woody urgently writing his memoir to be a lasting vestige of his great love for the giraffes and his unrequited love from Red. I didn't care for what I read. Instead, this reads like an old fashioned B western movie with stereotypical tropes of Hillbilly Hicks and a lovesick lad.  Even with all the great historic makings, it was just bad.    

Jill Clement's Revisits Initiation and Duration of Her Marriage with 30 Year Age Difference

Jill Clement's second memoir, CONSENT, covers a lot of ground but the central focus is on the relationship with her husband with whom she was married for more than 40 years who was 30 years older than her. Jill was a 16 year old  art student when she first met, and then seduced, her 47 year old married art teacher. I have three words for this: statue tory rape. After reading this sensitive, candid and eloquently written memoir, I've softened having been smitten by Jill's eloquence and uncertainties, and by a love that deepened over five decades spent together. "Does a story's ending excuse its beginning? Does a kiss in one moment mean something else entirely five decades later? Can a love that starts with such an asymmetrical balance of power ever right itself?" What struck me was Jill's questioning her younger self. "Were my acts selfless, or was this the price I was willing to pay for my own eternal youth-to always be the younger woman?" There are admissions to Jill's vanity throughout her memoir. "Where did Arnold get his energy? From me, of course." She further concedes,"How does one grow old as the younger woman?"..."One doesn't.  I always looked fresher than he. If I gained a few pounds, he gained more. If my skin wasn't as taut as it once was, his was looser". But as she came into her 50s and Arnold into his 80s, the disparity reared its aging folds. "He looked helpless and blind and unbearably old, and I feared that the most difficult part of my life was about to begin." This proves true, nevertheless, her steadfast devotion comes to the forefront with tenderness and a vital, solid partnership. "All I knew was that he was willing to learn from me, that I had something to teach." The balance in the relationship felt to be a true partnership; supportive, loving and wondrous. Each shared with the other first. Jill to read what she wrote to Arnold, and Arnold to show her his artwork. Both provided the other encouragement and constructive criticisms. They were gifted artists who shared the other's passions. CONSENT isn't a soft love story, or unflinching tribute to an entirely redeeming relationship. Their union disrupted a marriage and family and fed Jill's illusions. "From time to time, he must have yearned to return to his former life-the three bedroom ranch house, the comfortable savings account, all that he had given up for me." Jill noted, "The illicit, risqué lifestyle sited my fantasies of how artists and writers should live." Jill ends her enthralling memoir circling back to their beginnings, "...his arm dangling over the side-the same position he was in when I went to seduce him 45 years before. I crossed the room and stood over him. He stirred and opened his eyes. There might be a dispute about our first kiss, but there could be none about our last." 

S Harvey's ORBITAL Extraordinary Exploration of Space Travel and Humanity

Samantha Harvey's Booker Prize (2024) winning novel ORBITAL is an exceptional literary achievement that elevates the reader into outer space. It contemplates life's achievements, big and small. Harvey's eloquence raises questions of what gives life meaning while placing the reader inside an international space capsule. The power of Harvey's writing shares the experiences of feeling weightless in space packed in with six fictitious astronauts whose thoughts traverse thousands of feet above earth back down to their connections with earth and ties to each other. This beautiful novel feels expansive and condensed. It's both limitless in its grace while floating through the capsule or walking outside in space. There's also a sense of confinement within their spacesuits and space shuttle. The narrative pulls at your senses as well, and it imbues a visceral sense of weigthlessness. The quietness of its revelations from each of the astronauts is profound in their breathtaking observations looking back at earth and stirring in their mundane yearnings. "They speak about things they miss-fresh doughnuts, fresh cream, roast potatoes. The sweets of their childhood." The brilliance of the writing juxtaposes opposing conceits. "Those hearts, so inflated with ecstasy; at the spectacle of space, are at the same time withered by it." One astronaut questions his own motive for space exploration. "He's never sure if man's lust for space is curiosity. or ingratitude. If this weird hot longing makes him a hero or an idiot, Undoubtedly something just short of either." Our home planet is the crux of diametrical conceptions. "The earth is once again a glass marble in the blackest space. Bereft and fragile now that its neighboring stars and planets can no longer be seen. And yet it is, at the same time, the opposite of fragile. There's nothing there on its flawless surface that could break, and it's as if there is in fact nothing there at all-the more you look at it the less substance it has and the more it becomes an apparition, a Holy Ghost." Without rancor or proselytizing, the insanity of a divisive, embattled earth is scorned. Borders and warring factions are deemed irrelevant if not foolish and self-destructive. "What use are diplomatic games on a spacecraft. We are one. For now at least, we are one. Everything we have up here is only what we reuse and share. We can't be divided, this is the truth. We won't be because we can't be. We drink each other's recycled urine. We breathe each other's recycled air." The warning message contained within ORBITAL is forceful in its simplicity. "The planet is shaped by the sheer amazing force of human want, which has changed everything, the forests, the poles, the reservoirs, the glaciers, the rivers, the seas, the mountains, the coastlines, the skies, a planet contoured and landscaped by want." Harvey captivates the reader within her orbit. This is a must read, stellar novel. 

Melinda's Top Ten Literary Picks A Mix of Fiction/Non-Fiction/Short Stories and Poetry for 2024

                     The Top 10 Are Listed in Alphabetical Order by Author's Name: 

1.    Taffy Brodesser-Akner's LONG ISLAND COMPROMISE - Patriarch's kidnapping takes collateral damage on all family members.

2.    Nonfiction Sloane Crowley GRIEF IS for PEOPLE - Beautiful reflection on the life of a friend who took his own life unexpectedly.

3.    Louise Erdrich - THE SENTENCE continues to prove her prowess as a literary writer of multi-genres in this novel: Native American Renaissance, social reform and philosophy.

4.    Percival Everett JAMES - revisionist take on Twain's Huckleberry Finn. 

5.    Nonfiction Matt Haig shares his history of depression and offers practical suggestions. 

6.    Henry Hoke's OPEN THROAT - The narrator is a savvy mountain lion living under the HOLLYWOOD sign

7.    Miranda July's ALL FOURS - Mid-40s female's road trip takes a detour and explores her sexual drive.

8.    Alice Monroe - RUNAWAY The runway queen of short stories struts her stuff in this collection.

9.    Paul Murray's The BEE STING - Irish family drama that cuts deep with a touch of magic and blarney.

10.   George Saunders - PASTORALIA  Short story collection that will resonate long after being read.

BONUS

11.   Jesse Nathan Poetry - EGG TOOTH - Try a sampling of poetry that has some bite.

    

M July's ALL FOURS-Outside the Box Marital Perimeters

Miranda July's audacious novel ALL FOURS is a liberating manuscript meant for peri-menopausal women on the precipice of losing their libido. It can also be described as a solo female road trip that takes a salacious journey into sexual yearnings. This innovative novel covers a lot of territory spanning sexual obsessions, marital strictures, friendships, celebrity, conformity and feeling free to yourself. It's driven forward by its 45 female, unnamed narrator married to Harris, with a young child, Sam. Our narrator is a semi-famous artist whose artistry remains a mystery as does the gender of Sam whom they both take great pains to not gender label. She tells one woman who refers to her child as her son. "How dare you sex label our child." Our semi-famous heroine was en route to NYC when just outside of LA she waylaid her lust for Davy, the handsome young man who cleaned her car's windshield. No one would guess that instead of going to New York for two and a half weeks I had hidden out 30 minutes away with a boy who worked at Hertz. That would be an absurd conclusion to jump to." That isn't the only preposterous thing she does. She spends $20K on redecorating the motel room she's staying in with the wife of her boy toy obsession. And, when alone, "I just luxuriated in my beautiful room, sleeping late and anointing myself and having orgasms and listening to music and eating only the foods that appealed to me: hot dogs and puddings and orange Popsicles.. "I didn't feel guilty. I didn't tiptoe or walk on eggshells...I was happy." But, then sometimes she thought to herself, "What are you doing? You're betraying your husband. You miss your child." Part farce, part fantasy and part a stirring rumination about commitments and fulfilling one's desire. While lying in Davy's arms she tells herself, " I saw us lying like this for the rest of our lives, profoundly married to other people but always knowing we could return to our shared world. This was what I had always wanted; he was real enough to love and love me back but not so real that I couldn't desire him." ALL FOURS opens news doors, explores new marital structures and encourages self-discovery and heralds solipsism. ALL FOURS is a ferocious and manic work of fiction that embraces aging women and encourages them to be uninhibited, unencumbered and fearless. Yes, I'm being judgmental and sexist in calling ALL FOURS a tour-de-force read especially geared towards women's book groups.