A Tale of Two Eileens: The Switch by Beth O'Leary

Such an easy to enjoy novel, set in London and a small village in the Yorkshire Dales, about two women, twenty-nine-ish Leena and her seventy-nine year old grandmother Eileen.

Leena is a high-octane rising-star executive at a consulting company in London, known for her outstanding presentations. She's in a relationship with Ethan, something of a male counterpart. Eileen is supercharged too, but as the get-it-done, list-making center of village activities, serving on every committee and a friend to all. Her former husband, Wade, left her for a dance instructor, but she's doing just fine without him.

The two form a sandwich of a relationship with Marian, Leena's mother/Eileen's daughter. What they all share is their deep grief over the recent loss of Carla, Marian's younger daughter, to an agonizing death from cancer. Leena and Marian are currently estranged.

Leena has a panic attack and meltdown at a presentation, and her kind (fortunately) boss, Rebecca, forces her to take a two-month leave of absence so she can heal and regroup. Leena confides in Eileen, who urges her to visit in the village. They decide, on a whim, to switch places for the two months: Leena will stay in Eileen's village cottage and Eileen will go to London to Leena's apartment, which will be a chance for her to grab a taste of her youthful dream to be an independent woman in the city.

While the overall plot is somewhat predictable, many unlikely and surprising events ensue, and the result is a contemporary, colorful, entertaining, and heartfelt story that most readers are likely to enjoy (and maybe envy a bit). I definitely recommend Beth O'Leary's The Switch.

Just What the Title Says: Weight Watchers 50th Anniversary Cookbook

A nicely photographed cookbook with interesting anecdotes about the early days of Weight Watchers. Having been a member of Weight Watchers in the past (more than once), I am familiar with their programs and approach. They did work for me for a while at one time, but I got bored and a bit frustrated.

However, I thought it would be a good idea to check out this fairly new (2013) cookbook as I was looking for low carbohydrate recipes with restrained calorie counts. While I found a few, I was pretty surprised at the high values I found in many of their suggestions. Since its publication, there are newer books that feature food values and choices that are more relevant to my current needs.

You will probably find this book in your local library, as I did, and it certainly can't hurt to leaf through and make note of what may work for you. I appreciate the availability of books like this in my public library, and support its programs wholeheartedly.

Branching Out: All of a Kind Family Uptown

In this fourth book of the All of a Kind Family series, Mama, Papa, the five sisters and brother Charlie move away from New York's Lower East Side to the leafier, less-crowded Bronx, where the housing is newer and people of different backgrounds mix together a little more freely. Our observant Jewish family now lives in the second floor of a two-family house owned by the Irish Catholic Healys and there is an exchange of customs (the girls and Charlie see their first Christmas tree). Everyone is thrilled when Uncle Hyman and Lena have a baby.

World War I is imminent, Ella is in her final year of high school, and Sarah will be graduating from eighth grade. Ella becomes close friends with Grace Healy and the two families grow closer.

There are mishaps and challenges to be overcome: Mama becomes ill and must be hospitalized for an operation, Charlie has a dangerous episode while playing with matches, Sarah has a disappointment, and Jules, Ella's boyfriend, enlists in the Army. Jules befriends Bill, a fellow soldier, and just before the two ship out, he introduces Bill to Grace. They quickly fall for one another. The war news of Jules and Bill brings tears but in the end, of course, all is resolved.

As usual, author Sydney Taylor includes Jewish religious celebrations, such as preparation for the Sabbath, which the girls undertake while Mama is in the hospital, and the blessing for Hyman and Lena's son, but this time there is a little bit of Christmas included, when the family visits the Healys for the festivities. It's good to see these interactions with the wider world as the family's life moves forward. 

Tales of Immigrant Life: All of a Kind Family Downtown

To date, I have read All of a Kind Family, All of a Kind Family Downtown, More All of a Kind Family and All of a Kind Family Uptown, from the series of five books for older children written by Sydney Taylor in the 1950s. This is my favorite of the four, speaking strictly as an adult reader. Compared to the other titles, it feels more down-to-earth and less romanticized in its depictions of the difficulties of immigrant life on the Lower East Side of Manhattan around 1910. While all of the books are charming, this one does not gloss over the hard life people experienced. Poverty, illness and death were commonplace in all immigrant neighborhoods (and to some extent, still are) and we are not spared here from those sad realities.

The family, consisting of five sisters, a baby brother, father and mother, live in slightly better circumstances than some of their neighbors. They are observant Jews, and the holidays are beautifully explained and depicted. In this book, we hear more of Irish and Italian neighbors than we did in the first book, and in fact, a young boy named Guido plays an important role in the story. Guido is extremely poor. His father is dead, and his mother, who does piecework at home for a garment factory, has become very ill and can't work anymore. 

Ella, the oldest sister of our family, and her Mama pay a visit to Guido and his mother, bringing food and a small sum of money in case it is needed. Guido and the mother live in a back tenement, a building built behind the one facing the street. These were often the poorest and ill-cared for dwellings that can be found in a neighborhood that is already impoverished throughout because they tended to have even less light and air than the street front buildings. An illustration in the book depicts a slovenly rear yard with refuse, ashcans and alley cats.

Ella is sent to bring Miss Carey from the Settlement House and a doctor. Guido's mother is so ill she is hospitalized. The eventual outcome is as you might expect and it is heartbreaking. For a children's book, this is a story that will require special attention from parents and teachers to its young readers as they may find it upsetting.

There is more. Middle sister Henny's exploits and difficult personality are forthrightly addressed and we also learn about Miss Carey's sad back story.

Despite the difficult story line there are also celebrations of the Jewish holidays that all can enjoy. There are many lessons in this book, told with realism, but also with gentleness. As an adult reader, I found it very moving and in many ways, very contemporary. I would be careful though, in reading it with children who may find some of the events upsetting.

All's Well that Ends Well: More All of a Kind Family

What a delight! Chronologically, this is the third book in the series (although All of a Kind Family Downtown, the second, was written later). We are back with our favorite family on the Lower East Side of New York for more anecdotes and adventures. 

We enjoy a May Day celebration with the sisters and their friends, Charlie's antics with the baking of the weekly challah, and most importantly, Uncle Hyman finally meets the woman of his dreams – Lena, a new immigrant who happens to be an expert seamstress and cook and most importantly, loves him back. The romance progresses and they decide to marry, but there's a major problem: Lena is a victim of the latest polio epidemic, and though she recovers, she doesn't feel she should marry Hyman because she now walks with a pronounced limp. Hyman is heartbroken.

I felt so sad reading this episode, as it reminded me of my own dear grandmother, Pearl. Pearl was technically not my grandmother, but actually my great aunt. Her older sister Jennie (my natural grandmother) was my grandfather's first wife but Pearl, a victim of polio which left her with one leg shorter than the other and a severe lifelong limp, lived with Jennie and her family for many years after their own mother died in the flu epidemic of 1918. Jennie died before I was born, and for sake of propriety and as Jewish custom dictates, my grandfather married his sister-in-law. Years later, I once asked Grandmom Pearl, a pretty, loving and warm-hearted woman, why she hadn't married as a young woman. After some hesitation, she explained that she had had a boyfriend and they wanted to marry, but the young man's mother dissuaded him because Pearl was "crippled". How I ached for young Pearl experiencing such cruelty! We never spoke of it again, and Grandmom remained her cheerful and indomitable self, but I often think of how heartbroken she must once have been.

It worked out much better for Hyman and Lena. The family stepped in and convinced Lena that she should marry Hyman, whom she dearly loved, and the wedding was celebrated joyfully.

No Country for Women Either: Heresy by Melissa Lenhardt

I was really looking forward to loving this book, but I was so disappointed. The concept was great – a small gang of women who come together as outlaws after the Civil War and commit robberies across Colorado. The women are a former slave, a titled woman from England, and an aspiring travel writer who is making her way in the West. The women must pretend to be men, live rough, and take care of each other and themselves. 

I was also anticipating enjoying the methods the author used – fictionalized materials stylized as interviews of the former slave decades later as part of the WPA Writer's Project, diaries, and "reproductions" of newspaper articles about the hold-ups. 

After about seventy pages or so, I felt completely bogged down by the format of mixed materials. Additionally, the book was literally difficult to read, with everything but the reproduction newspaper articles set in a light, thin sans serif typeface. I just can't understand what the book designer was thinking – there is a reason why this review is in a serif font – it's so much easier to read. 

I'm sorry to say that the book, that I waited weeks for as an interlibrary loan went back today. I tried, I really did, but with so many others on my list, I no longer feel compelled to keep reading something that doesn't grab me and make me want to keep reading. 

Lost in Vermont: Afterlife by Julia Alvarez

This engaging and thoughtful work is the latest from the novelist Julia Alvarez, who came to the United States from the Dominican Republic when she was a young girl, and ultimately became a professor of English and the recipient of many honors for her work, including the National Medal of the Arts.

The character at the heart of the story is Antonia, a recently retired English professor in rural Vermont, a Latina from, yes, the Dominican Republic. Her husband, Sam, has just passed away and she is working painfully through her profound grief. She is one of four very close sisters, one of whom, Felicia, nicknamed Izzy, tends to go from crisis to crisis.

Her closest neighbor is a farmer who depends on the labor of undocumented Mexican immigrants, one of whom is sent over to help Antonia with some chores that her late husband would normally have done. Somehow, Antonia becomes embroiled in the life of the worker, Mario, and his fiancé, Estela, who is trying to follow him from Mexico, but has run into trouble with the unscrupulous coyote who is managing her journey across the border and beyond.

Meanwhile, Antonia and two of her sisters become alarmed when things escalate with Izzy, and they must find a way to intervene in a fraught situation.

Antonia feels overwhelmed by so much emotional turmoil as she deals with her own loss, but it feels as though the stresses just keep mounting. Despite them all, she makes her way.

Antonia's story is told with insight, sensitivity, and ironic humor. It is the story of a woman with a rich intellectual and emotional internal life who must confront external situations she doesn't want to own, and find a path to navigate through so she can make peace with herself.

It's quite a rare and refreshing thing to encounter a novel about the inner life and challenges of a woman who is no longer young – as it so often seems in real life, women beyond the age of their peak attractiveness or the travails of young(ish) motherhood seem to disappear and become almost anonymous non-entities in our society. There are plenty of us that no one seems to see, so we are not often the heroines of novels. Too bad, as our experience gives us plenty to say.

Sweet Memories: All-of-a-Kind Family by Sydney Taylor

This charming book is the first in the beloved series by Sydney Taylor, originally published in 1951, recounting the daily life and adventures of a family of five girls and their parents living on the Lower East Side of New York City in 1912. The series is particularly of note because it portrays a Jewish-American family, something of a rarity in children's books, and even more so at the time the books were published.

We meet the five sisters: Ella, Henny (Henrietta), Sarah (modeled on Sydney Taylor herself), Charlotte and Gertie (Gertrude) and accompany them to the public library where they develop a special relationship with the librarian, shopping in the street markets and more. A serious illness temporarily challenges the family.

Taylor explains the holidays and religious practices of the family in a very accessible and appealing way so that we can share with them. Readers experience the festivities of Purim and Succoth, and the celebration of the Fourth of July. We identify with the sisters as they experience the life around them and grow up in a loving family that is working hard to succeed in America.

Babe Betrayed: The Swans of Fifth Avenue by Melanie Benjamin

Melanie Benjamin's fast-paced read relies on a smooth mix of historical detail, believable dialog and vivid description. The "Swans" were the writer and later, media personality, Truman Capote's coterie of New York society women who hung on his every word as he flattered and cultivated them at the best French restaurants and swank cocktail parties starting in the period of his early fame in the 1950s. The women included Pamela Churchill (later Pamela Harriman, Ambassador to France during the Clinton Administration), Nancy "Slim" Keith, an often-married renowned beauty, and most importantly, the enigmatic Babe Paley, the wife of William Paley, the powerful businessman who founded and ran CBS.

The beautiful Babe Paley, who was always perfectly dressed, coiffed and groomed, became, over time, Truman Capote's closest friend, and the two were nearly inseparable for a time, despite her husband and his longtime lover and companion Jack Dunphy. While Babe appeared to have it all, her life was far from the perfection she presented to the world, and she confessed all of her unhappy secrets to Truman – later on, that would prove to be much to her chagrin.

Truman Capote achieved enormous success and celebrity as the writer of Breakfast at Tiffany's, (a novella that appeared in 1958 and was adapted into the classic film with Audrey Hepburn) but most notably, In Cold Blood, a crime novel based on a brutal true-life event, published in 1966. As an aside, I have to say that it was the most chilling and compelling book I can recall ever having ever read, going back to the early 1980s.

However, the bigger they are, the harder they fall. Over time, per the many episodes described in Benjamin's book, Truman fell so far that he died in 1984 at just 59, due to his abuse of drugs and alcohol, segueing from the boyish beauty of his youth to the nearly unrecognizable caricature of himself I remember from TV's Hollywood Squares and the film Murder by Death in 1976.

As for Babe, she and her society companions were thinly disguised in Capote's "La Côte Basque 1965", published in Esquire magazine as the opening to his unfinished novel, Answered Prayers. Capote used a mix of genuine and fake names but it was apparently obvious to those in the know about New York high society who the real players were, and he revealed many of the humiliating secrets Babe had entrusted to him. Capote quickly became a persona non grata and was abandoned by his former friends, Babe in particular.

The Swans of Fifth Avenue is a compelling novel that describes all this and much, much more, in great detail, with a bevy of all-caps names that will be familiar to many readers.

Later, Babe, a heavy smoker, developed lung cancer and died in 1978, aged just 63: a sad conclusion to the life of a woman who appeared, at least superficially, to have had everything.

Refined Trailblazer: The Woman Behind the New Deal by Kirstin Downey

Before I read this book, I knew that Frances Perkins had been Secretary of Labor for FDR, but I don't think I really grasped the rarity of her situation or the importance of her work. I knew nothing about her background or her closeness to FDR. She was the first woman to occupy a cabinet post, with all the prejudice and negativity you can imagine that would entail, but despite that, she was the architect of Social Security, unemployment insurance, worker's compensation, and the eight-hour workday. Her contributions to safety in the workplace are legion.

She lived a long life, dying at eighty-five, and worked nearly until her last days. She was widely known in political and academic circles, but now, in our modern age, she is more or less forgotten, and overshadowed by Eleanor Roosevelt, who of course had many remarkable and important accomplishments, but was not an official part of the government and not a policy member.

The author, Kirstin Downey, a former reporter for the Washington Post, has done a remarkable job in creating a portrait of Frances Perkins and emphasizing the importance of her accomplishments. The research must have been long and intensive, but the resulting book is so worth it. By reading it, not only will you learn about Perkins, but will obtain a truly in-depth understanding of the Settlement House movement (where Perkins got her start as a social worker), the Great Depression, World War II and the root causes of the evils of McCarthyism in the 1950s. Perkins was right in the middle of all of it. The lessons of her role in history, which ends in the 1960s, are helpful as a background to the situation we find our country in right now. We all have so much to learn...

Abandoned: The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone by Olivia Laing

I found this subject matter intriguing, since I had also lived alone in Manhattan for eleven years, and often thought about so many people living so closely together but maintaining such singular and single lives. At times it was invigorating to be alone in the crowd, walking the streets on my personal quests, but there could be lonely moments when it seemed there was no one who was available to go along for a meal, a walk, a drink...and this was long before the Internet, texting or the social media we rely on today to keep us connected. Fortunately I was not the sort of person who was intimidated by a singular seat in a movie theater or a coffee shop, and as a devoted reader, I always had the company of a pile of books just crying out to be savored.

I got a little tired of reading about the author's melancholy experience of being alone in a strange city, but when she moved on to writing about the artist Edward Hopper, I was much more engaged, as I have always been intrigued by his work, which seems so emblematic of certain aspects of the city. I found the section on Andy Warhol interesting at first, but about a third of the way through, my desire to continue with the book petered out. I leafed through the rest, but nothing else really caught my eye and encouraged me to continue. There is a long section on AIDS, but perhaps because I lived through the height of the epidemic and lost friends, neighbors and acquaintances, I didn't want to revisit that horrible time. 

I abandoned the book after about sixty-five pages.

So, while I didn't finish it, I am finished with it. It will be back to the library later in the day...  

The Spirit Remains Strong: The Lost Boys by Faye Kellerman

After 26 novels featuring the same two primary characters, you might think a series could be getting stale, but I can assure you that is not the case with Faye Kellerman's latest suspense novel, The Lost Boys. Detective Peter Decker and his wife Rina Lazarus are back, along with Pete's partner, Tyler McAdams, to solve a disturbing crime, and Gabe, Peter and Rina's foster son, who has family issues to resolve. 

These characters keep becoming more complete, and more nuanced, with each book. They've aged and changed in a realistic way – Peter is now looking towards 70, and Rina is well into her 50s. They've left behind Peter's high-pressure job at the LAPD and have already spent a few years in a small college town in upstate New York, where the crimes are fewer but no less complex.

The blended Decker family includes Peter's daughter Cindy and her husband Koby, Rina's two sons Jacob and Sam and their wives, Peter and Rina's daughter together, Hannah, and her husband plus a tableful of grandchildren. Gabe is in his 20s now too, and in a serious relationship. The changing and expanding family figures heavily in this book.

Along with the usual murder plot, Kellerman dwells heavily on where life will next take the Deckers. What lies in store for this unique couple? Observant Jews, Peter came late to discovering his heritage but has throughly embraced it, while Rina is as contemporary as can be while honoring her Orthodox background, keeping kosher, dressing modestly but stylishly, and spreading her goodwill and kindness everywhere she goes. Kellerman acknowledges how priorities change during life's stages.

It was thoroughly enjoyable to spend some time with these characters, who at this point, feel like old friends. I'd love a seat at their Shabbos table sometime...especially if Rina does the cooking.

 

Writers and Artists under Fire: Red Letter Days by Sarah-Jane Stratford

The Red Scare of the 1950s destroyed or derailed the careers, personal lives and reputations of many prominent people working in publishing and entertainment. Being denounced as a Communist, or suspected of having Communist or Socialist political sympathies affected the famous, including writers Lillian Hellman, Ring Lardner, Jr. and Dalton Trumbo, and directors Martin Ritt, Lee Grant and Jules Dassin, but average working Americans, especially union members, Jews, and African-Americans who were working for change in organizations like the NAACP were caught up in the mania and arrested, jailed or called to testify before HUAC, the now-notorious House Un-American Activities Committee.

In Red Letter Days, Phoebe Adler is a young woman trying to make her way in the bohemian atmosphere of 1955 Greenwich Village. After growing up poor on Manhattan's Lower East Side, she worked in an aircraft factory during World War II, as many women did, and made her views on equal pay for women known. Phoebe's ambition was to become a writer, and she had finally achieved some minor success with scripts for the new medium of television. Then the unthinkable happened – she was blacklisted, fired from her job, branded a Red, and told to sign a loyalty oath...

Phoebe's parents had passed away and she helped support her older sister Mona who had been ill from birth with a rare disease. She lived in a facility where she was an object of medical research in exchange for her room, board and care, but Phoebe contributed money so Mona had her own room and some extras. The two were very close and Phoebe worried about Mona's gradually deteriorating health.

When Phoebe found herself jobless and in danger of arrest, she went to Mona for guidance. Mona advised her to get her things together, and buy a ticket on the first ship to London that she could. Phoebe reluctantly agreed and with her small amount of savings, and some help from her best friend Anne, she fled across the pond on the Queen Mary.

Hannah Wolfson was also a former New Yorker, living in London with her husband and two young daughters. Both were journalists, but Hannah had found a new career in TV and started a company to produce programs for ITV, the commercial competition to the BBC. 

Hannah was sympathetic and took Phoebe on as a script girl. Hiring blacklisted employees was risky, but Hannah had a number of them using assumed names. The TV show they were producing was meant for the British and American markets, so the credits could not show any blacklisted individuals. Gradually Phoebe settled into the job, and became close to Hannah, her friends and associates. Hannah invites her to call Mona each Sunday from her apartment when rates are lower – Phoebe has no phone and the calls are very expensive.

Things go well for Phoebe at first. She sells a few scripts to Hannah, and meets a charming man. While she is always fearful of being deported, she feels relatively safe in sympathetic Britain.

Hannah's program becomes a great success once it airs and her future looks bright until her husband shifts from supportive to cold. They divorce, painfully for Hannah, but the show still thrives.

Gradually, it becomes clear that neither woman is truly safe from investigation, and Phoebe is arrested by American agents...

Author Sarah-Jane Stratford has done the research and referenced real-life events and the lives of some actual individuals, constructing a compelling novel with a fast pace and plenty of tension that will keep you turning the pages till the very end. Be sure to read the Author's Note for a complete experience.