Monday, September 18, 2006

The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards - This story opens during a snowstorm in 1962, when David's wife, Norah, goes into early labor. There is a terrible snow storm that prevents her doctor from making it in time for the birth, so David and his nurse, Caroline, must handle it themselves. Caroline puts Norah to sleep (apparently what they did in the "olden days") and David unexpectedly delivers his own set of twins. The first baby, a boy, is healthy; the second child, a baby girl, has Down Syndrome. Thinking only of the memory of growing up with a very ill sister, David makes a split-second decision. He asks Caroline to take his infant daughter to an institution where she will be cared for, and when Norah awakes, he tells her that the second child was stillborn. Clearly not the right decision for David to make, yet he believes he's done the right thing for all concerned. However, his decision has a ripple effect, starting with the fact that Caroline doesn't leave the baby at the institution...opting instead to raiser her herself.

This is a rich and well-written page-turner that explores how mysterious ties can hold a family together even through the most dire circumstances, and how love can provide the greatest redemption.

Bitter is the New Black by Jen Lancaster - A snappy, witty memoir about a dotcom princess who loses her job (and, seemingly, her sanity) when the market turned bad. The book is a hilarious and biting account of her transition back into a "normal" person from the self-absorbed, shopaholic, workaholic that she had become trying to make it to the top. From the scene where she steals a handbag from a homeless person to the one where she lives in squalor next to a building being built by Russian immigrants, this book if full of side-splitting laughter.