SOMEBODY'S DAUGHTER A Memoir Ashley C. Ford

Ashley Ford entices the reader into memoir SOMEBODY'S DAUGHTER with a powerful introduction into her life as young woman.  Having just moved in for the first time with her partner, Kelly, Ashley receives a call from her mother.  She can tell by her mother's voice, something serious is awry.  Cutting to the chase, her mother informs her the father who has been absent her entire life is about to be released from prison.  Not knowing how to process this information, Ashley turns to Kelly to access her feelings.  Ford skillfully guides us back to her early, happy childhood with a single parent and beloved younger brother and colorful maternal grandmother.  Being raised in financial constraints with one parent may not  be foreign to many, but understanding the impact growing up with a father incarcerated throughout childhood into adulthood, poses additional obstacles unbeknown to many which seem overwhelming.  Furthermore, Ashley's mother had a short fuse and the two sustain a combative life-long relationship.  Their frustrating and difficult relationship also had its share of humor and tenderness.  The enigma of why her father is incarcerated is kept secret until it is surprisingly and inadvertently revealed by her grandmother.  Ashley has been keeping her own secret.  She was raped by her ex-boyfriend after trying to terminate their relationship.  Ashley struggle to process her own trauma along with needing to forgive her father convicted of raping two women.  Ashley's memoir is bookended by the announcement of her father's impending release and their anxious bus joyous reunion.  However, this still leaves a quandary not satisfactorily addressed.  How did receiving the news and the reality of having her father in her life for the first time imprint upon her life?  Ashley Ford is a talented writer but her accessible bio fails to stir an emotional response able to galvanize a compelling read.  Still, her memoir offers an alliance for readers who share the heinous experience of rape or the angst longing for a parent serving long prison sentences.  Ashley's resilience and her unflappability prevail over these traumatic trials in a manner that doesn't trivialize their impacts but appear to significantly mitigate them.  

LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY-Chemistry Class Should Be Such a Gas

The surprisingly delightful and deceptively insightful novel, LESSONS in CHEMISTRY by Bonnie Garmus, was a fun read from beginning end.  Gramus has created a heroine, Elizabeth Zott, is not to be underestimated.  She is unflappable, adaptable and remarkable in every which way.   Being a woman chemist in the chauvinistic world of the1960s, Elizabeth Zott does not cow-tow to surmised norms that impose restrictions.   Zott got plenty of moxie, poise and a penchant for pursuing scientific research in the field of chemistry.   Zott is fortunate to cross wires with renown chemist Calvin Evans and after two auspicious interactions, a full on attraction and mutual love bond unite the two in happily unwedded bliss that tragically goes amiss.  Fortunately, Gramus debut novel's turbulent plot imbues Zott with characters that demonstrate the similarly dynamic and electrifying qualities she contains.  Calvin and Elizabeth's positive interactions are based on mutual love and respect which elicits problematic negativity from envious people around their periphery.   Their co-habitation outside marriage is disdained which doesn't cause an iota of chagrin for Elizabeth.  Elizabeth is a vibrant and original character we're magnetically drawn to.  So too, for her remarkable daughter, Mad, a precocious and beguiling child, their dog six-thirty with an extensible vocabulary taught by Elizabeth and their neighbor Harriet who comes to help care for both Mad and Elizabeth.  The unstable working environment becomes volatile.  After being fired from her post in the labs, Elizabeth nabs a job as a TV chef personality that surprisingly becomes a quantifiable success due in part to the osmosis of chemical properties intrinsic in cooking and the ideas of enhancing  women's self-expectations.  As Elizabeth knowingly confers, "Chemistry is change and change is the core of your belief system.  Which is good because that's what we need more of-people who refuse to accept the status quo, who aren't afraid to take on the unacceptable."  Mixed into this delectable soufflé of comedy and theology is the hypocrisy of religious configurations which are questioned with a delicate touch.  Mad, at age five, is portrayed as worldly wise informs the elder priest she befriends, who tells her religion is based on faith.  "'But you realize,' she said carefully, as if not to embarrass him further, 'that faith isn't based on religion. Right?'"  Both six-thirty and Harriett add their insights in hilariously off-handed manners which adds supporting elements to a notable mixture with positive results.  My hypothesis based on sound observations having devoured CHEMISTRY LESSONS with relish, reading it will elicit discernible increase in serotonin levels.  I need not embellish.  

POMPEI-Historic Novel by Harris - Good Reading if Going There

Before the devastating eruption of 79 AD, the people of Pompeii and Herculaneum were unaware they were living next to an explosive and deadly volcano.   In fact, there wasn't a name for volcanoes until after the fateful eruption of Mount Vesuvius that razed the city of Pompeii, its inhabitants and neighboring Herculaneum.  Following the massive destruction, the word volcano came into being, named for Vulcan, the Roman God of the Flame and Metal Forgery.  In POMPEII, Harris attempts recapture what life was like for the people of this era.  The novel does an interesting job of depicting the wealthy aristocracy at the time as well as slaves whose grueling, subhuman treatments came at the whims of their owners.  Women at all social strata were completely subjugated to men.  It's remarkable to consider how advanced the citizens of Pompeii were over 2,000 years ago having designed and built their aqueduct system as well as the advanced architectural constructions that have remained in existence.  However, it's startling there was no foreknowledge of the massive havoc that was about to be unleashed by Mount Vesuvius.  The were no records of the major destructive force they were about to experience.  Earthquakes were known to occur and a large portion of the population left Pompeii 17 years prior after a major earthquake leveled much of the city.   The novel is most intriguing for having us appreciate what it was like to be a first hand witness to this cataclysmic event that had never before occurred.  It's worthwhile to appreciate how history is recorded.  Pliny the Younger, the author, lawyer and historian, lived 18 miles away in the bay of Naples when Mount Vesuvius exploded.  Pliny is a minor character in the novel.  His quest for knowledge have left us the first detailed descriptions of what he observed.  "It's general appearance can best be expressed as being like an umbrella pine, for it rose to a great height on a soft trunk and then split off into branches."  Plinian is the term volcanologist now used when referring to eruptions with a high plume that expands over a massive area spewing ash.  While this is all significant and serves to pique an interest into life during this epoch, the narrative is drivel in its storytellling.   The young aqueduct captain, Atilius, whose heroic efforts to repair the aqueducts are thwarted by a villainous, wealthy magistrate intent on destroying him.  Alas, Atilius will prevail and he and his nemesis' daughter, may have been the only possible survivors.   If you're planning a trip to Napoli, this lightweight history that may suffice. 

HELLO BEAUTIFUL-Oprah's Pick Sisters Love Each Other and Same Man

Ann Napitaliano's best selling novel, HELLO BEAUTIFUL is an Oprah Bookclub Pick.  I didn't care for this story filled with foolishness.  The poppycock plot centers around a family of four Padavano sisters.   The two eldest, Julia and Sylvie who share an extremely tight bond until it unravels when Julie's husband and father of their infant daughter, William, decides he no longer wants to be married or a parent.  Set in Chicago, William and Julie met as students at Northwestern in the 1980s.  William is on the school's varstiy basketball team.  William was raised by parents who never recovered from the death of their daughter which coincided with the time of William's birth.  William's parent had no love to offer their son and were only too glad to dissociate with him when he left for college.  The sisters were raised in an extremely close and loving household.   When William's hoop dreams are shattered by an injury, he loses his drive and walks away from his wife and baby girl and into Lake MI intending to drown himself.  Julia intends to have nothing more to do with him but younger sister Sylvie feels concern and a connection with him.  Sylvie stays by William's side throughout his recovery in a mental hospital and professes her love for him after his release.  This breaks every sister code in the book.  Their mother is appalled  by Sylvie and William's relationship.  She tells her daughter, "It's unhealthy...It's like you're getting in bed with her marriage."  Even Sylvie wondered, "If William was disappointed that her breasts were smaller than Julia's, her hips less curvaceous.  Had Julia been a better lover?"  Sister Emeline who is gay feels sympathetic for Sylvie, as she struggled with her choice of who to love.  "I didn't want to love Josie.  It was hard for me to accept the fact that we don't choose who we love."  This insipid story is awash in soapy melodrama. Separated for two decades, Sylvie and Julie are only reunited when learning of Sylvie's terminal brain tumor diagnosis.  Julia had maintained the fabrication to her daughter, Alice, her father was dead and was kept apart from her aunts and first  cousin in Chicago.  Alice first learns of her father being alive in her 20s.  Furious with her mother for keeping this from her and wanting to meet her dad, she flies to Chicago to  meet him on the day her Aunt Sylvie dies.  Nonetheless, the funeral bridges the decades and the divides within the family caused by two sisters having married the same man and reconciliations and harmony ensues.  Any literary comparison the author tires to make to "Little Women" is ludicrous.  The writing is weary and shamelessly pitiful.  I don't know why anyone would say hello to this nonsense, I say goodbye.  

Romantic Comedy-Can a Female Comedy Writer Find Love with a Rock Star-Ho Hum

Curtis Sittenfeld's "novel Romantic Comedy" poses the question, can an average looking 30 something woman be loved for herself by a handsome rock star?  The answer is - why is this a question that matters?  Set in NYC just prior to the pandemic.  Sally is an ordinary looking plain, Jane with a sharp, comic brain. She's is a writer for a SNL show and meets Noah, the rock star, when he's guest hosting.  A friendly working rapport is struck when Sally helps Noah with the skits she's written that he'll be starring in for the show.  Sally loves the zany, high pressure demands of the show.  She's friends with the writers and female stars of the show.  Her life seems ideal although there's not a special someone in life.  Who could find the time with her schedule?  Can it be possible the super hot recording artist, Noah, will show her he's interested in her?  Could it possibly be real that Noah would feel attracted to an average looking woman when he's known for dating super models and A list stars?  Reese picked this lame novel for her bookclub which is in keeping with her other slim pickings.  The best part of the novel is the epistolary section where Noah and Sally communicate via emails during the Covid Pandemic.  The old fashioned written communication allows us to know them individually and how they get to know one another.  There are only likable characters and friendly banter throughout.  However, unless you think people grovel to beautiful looking people, this isn't the novel for you.