Author: Joanna Goodman

I follow a group on Facebook called Literary Hoarders. When this book was promoted I checked at our library and, although it was out at the moment, it was in their collection. I picked it up just a few days ago and I couldn’t put it down.

Maggie and Gabriel live next to each other in rural Quebec and begin meeting in the cornfields that border their properties. Maggie’s father is a staunch Englishman while Gabriel’s family are French. Although married to a Frenchwoman himself, Maggie’s father forbids her from seeing Gabriel. Maggie is sent to live on a distant farm where she finds herself pregnant. Maggie is uncertain whether her baby is Gabriel’s or the result of her rape by her uncle. Maggie cuts off all contact with Gabriel. When the baby is born Maggie’s father makes arrangements for it to be taken away and Maggie only catches a glimpse of her daughter. The book follows the lives of Maggie and her daughter, Elodie (“Melody without the M”).

It is a fact that during the 1950’s in Quebec unwanted and unadopted children were placed in orphanages run by the Church. Under Duplessis reign in Quebec he initiated a scheme to turn all orphanages into mental institutions thereby acquiring more Federal funding for the province.

Elodie has never been adopted and is eventually diagnosed as mentally retarded; her life in the orphanage was not good, but life in a mental hospital was almost unbearable. Although it isn’t an easy path, Maggie, Gabriel and Elodie eventually are able to connect.

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Author: Lisa Jackson

This apparently is a rewrite (by the author) of an earlier book. I’ve read and enjoyed Lisa Jackson’s books before but I don’t think I’d ever read the first version of the book.

A child born from a one-night-stand between two cousins has been adopted with the understanding that the adopted mother and her son would disappear from Boston where the wealthy family involved wanted to avoid a scandal. Of course eventually they want the child back again and therein lies the story.

The book was predictable but, that being said, I couldn’t put it down and read it from start to finish over the weekend.

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Author: Ella Harper

I was back on my Kindle for this one. The story revolves around four friends and follows them from their University days to fifteen years later. Lives have changed, marriages have been made but they all still remain friends. The interest for me was the friends were both male and female; so often these “friend” stories involve only women.

The book is set out in short chapters each revolving around one of the four characters; I have to say that shortly into the story I didn’t particularly like the short glimpses we got of each character. There was enough drama surrounding the friends to keep it interesting.

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Author: Charles Martin

Kathryn passed this book to me but I think it originated with either Regan or Tracie – I love being able to share books but with more of us on e-readers it doesn’t work as well. As long as there are yard sales though there will probably always be “real” books to share.

I enjoyed the novel but when I added it to my “To Read” list I thought it was a true story. A doctor and a journalist take a flight in poor weather hoping to reach home – one to their wedding and the other to their surgical duties. Even as the pilot is suffering a massive heart attack, he is able to land the plane safely but it is in a very remote mountain range.

Told mostly from the point of view of the surgeon we learn a little about his life and a lot about their struggle to survive. It wasn’t until the very last bit of the book that I realized something was a little “off”.

Now that I know the ending I won’t bother seeing the movie.

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