The Age of Desire by Jennie Fields

The Age of Desire by Jennie Fields

Read by Meredith Mitchell

14 hrs, 2 mins.

Published January 2012 by Pamela Dorman Bks

Publisher's Summary:

They say that behind every great man is a woman. Behind Edith Wharton, there was Anna Bahlmann-her governess turned literary secretary, and her mothering, nuturing friend. When at the age of forty-five Edith falls passionately in love with a dashing, younger journalist, Morton Fullerton, and is at last opened to the world of the sensual, it threatens everything certain in her life-but especially her abiding friendship with Anna. As Edith's marriage crumbles, the women must face the fragility at the heart of all friendships. 

The Age of Desire takes us on a vivid journey through Wharton's early Gilded Age world: Paris with its glamorous literary salons and dark secret cafes, the Wharton's elegant house in Lenox, Massachusetts, and Henry James' manse in Rye, England. Edith's real letters and intimate diary entries are woven throughout the book. The Age of Desire brings to life one of literatures most beloved writers, whose own story was as complex and nuanced as that of any of the heroines she created.

My Thoughts: 

This one has been on my TBR list for at least a decade. I'm not sure that I ever got any further than the name Edith Wharton in the publisher's summary before I added this one to the list. As a huge fan of Wharton, I felt certain I'd enjoy anything that taught me more about the woman behind the books I loved, even if it was fiction. 

I feel that listening to this one might have really had a negative impact on my impression of the book. Mitchell does a perfectly acceptable job of reading all of the book except in her voicing of Morton Fullerton; Fullerton was, we learn early on, originally from Boston and Mitchell struggles trying to voice not just a man but a man from Boston. Every time his character "spoke" I was so focused on the reading that it overtook the actually words he was saying. 

But that wasn't my only issue with this book. Was it a book about Wharton's affair with Fullerton and the end of her marriage? Was it a book about the relationship between Wharton and Bahlmann? Of course the answer to both of those is "yes." For me, though, I would have preferred a book that chose one over main story line over the other. In the end, Anna is with Edith from the beginning of the book to the end. So it's their story. But a great deal of the book focuses on the interactions between Wharton and Fullerton, and a fair amount of the time is spent working up to them consummating their relationship and then their various times together. Kirkus Reviews calls those passages "excellent erotic writing." I must admit to having sped up the book to get through those parts of the book; they felt a bit out of place to me. But I imagine that Fields felt like she needed to include them to make readers understand why Wharton was so enthralled by a man who most people warned her away from, a man who frequently ghosted her, a man who was clearly not as attached to Edith as she was to him, a man who obviously scams people. 

One last quibble - in my opinion, the book would have benefited from culling 50 or so pages. Some "scenes" could have been omitted entirely without losing the point of the book. I understand that Fields drew heavily from Wharton's diaries and letters and it may be that she wanted to hew to those documents as she made her way through the story she wanted to tell. Perhaps less of the back and forth between Edith and Morton; perhaps less detail about Teddy's manic or depressive episodes. 

All of that and I still believe that had I read this book in print, I would have enjoyed it more. I certainly learned more about Wharton's character - some that made me feel for her and some things that made me think that she was frequently a person that she might have skewered in one of her books. 

Life: It Goes On - March 9

Happy Sunday! Wow are we having a March! Tuesday we had rain most of the day that turned to snow late in the day that turned into a blizzard that shut down most of the town Wednesday. Today it will be 64 degrees and most of the snow has already melted. Seems like a lot of the country is seeing this crazy weather lately! 

We have officially entered my happy time of year with the arrival today of daylight savings time. I know a lot of people struggle with springing forward and it does take me a hot minute to adjust. But it's well worth it, in my opinion, for that extra hour of sunlight when I get home from work. May our state legislators who want to end daylight savings time \

Last Week I: 

Listened To: I finished Bill Clegg's Did You Ever Have A Family (that was not at all what I was expecting!) and started Katherine Center's How to Walk Away.

Watched: Some college basketball, some Renovation Aloha (our latest Sunday morning guilty pleasure) and Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy. It's not up to the original, but it does bring in all of the cast from the previous movies and ties things up nicely. 

Read: I'm reading both Claire Lombardo's Same As It Ever Was and Lian Dolan's Abigail and Alexa Save The Wedding. 

Made: I had a mental flashback to days of blizzards when my kids still lived at home and decided I need to back something to munch while we were shut in (for the whole whooping 24 hours that we didn't leave the house!) and made monster cookies. Then yesterday I made a gooey butter cake to redeem myself for the last one I made that was overcooked. 

Enjoyed: We were invited to Mini-him's and Miss C's apartment for dinner last night. Mini-him made Thai and I brought that cake; afterwards we played a couple of games - Utter Nonsense (where we discovered that none of us are very good at accents even after a couple of drinks!) and I Should Have Known That (which was great fun because I won!). 

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This Week I’m:  

Planning: Getting the house ready for company this weekend and getting a meal plan in place. 

Thinking About: Gardens and flowers. 

Feeling: Strangely accomplished. I haven't gotten anything big done but have been knocking off a lot of little projects, including some I hadn't planned on doing, like polishing some brass pieces that I had never seen polished. 

Looking forward to: Friday my family arrives to celebrate my dad's 90th birthday (which is actually on Thursday), sixteen of us in all. We haven't had so many of us together in four years, since my mom died. 

Question of the week: How do you feel about Daylight Savings Time? 

The God of the Woods by Liz Moore

The God of the Woods by Liz Moore

496 pages

Published July 2024 by Penguin Publishing Group

Publisher's Summary: 

Early morning, August 1975: a camp counselor discovers an empty bunk. Its occupant, Barbara Van Laar, has gone missing. Barbara isn’t just any thirteen-year-old: she’s the daughter of the family that owns the summer camp and employs most of the region’s residents. And this isn’t the first time a Van Laar child has disappeared. Barbara’s older brother similarly vanished fourteen years ago, never to be found.

As a panicked search begins, a thrilling drama unfolds. Chasing down the layered secrets of the Van Laar family and the blue-collar community working in its shadow, Moore’s multi-threaded story invites readers into a rich and gripping dynasty of secrets and second chances. It is Liz Moore’s most ambitious and wide-reaching novel yet.

My Thoughts: 

This is one of those books that's gotten so much buzz in the last few months that I'd almost convinced myself not to read it, knowing there was no way it could live up to that hype. But I'd read and loved Moore's Long Bright River in 2020 (a series adaptation of which is set to premiere March 13th on Peacock) and knew that she could write a book that would make me want to stay up late reading. So as soon as I thought I could manage a 500 page book, I checked it out. 

I tried to give my husband a quick summary of this once I was done and he felt it sounded like one of those movies where there is just too much going on, too many characters, too many terrible things happening. You know the kind of movies I'm taking about, the kind where the character's phone runs out of battery just as her car dies on a dark road with a killer somewhere on the loose nearby. And I get that. There are a lot of characters, the book bounces back and forth in time, there are a lot of relationships that play out different ways over time, there actually is a mass murder on the loose, and we're getting the narrative from a lot of different perspectives. Not many people could make it work. Liz Moore does. 

"A long novel that at first is hard to put down. By page 200, impossible." —Stephen King

I couldn't have said it better than Stephen King (well, of course I couldn't!). I got into work later than usual every day last week because I couldn't put this one day once I started reading it while I ate breakfast. The hubby had to pitch in to make dinners because once I sat down to read after work, I couldn't be bothered to cook. It all worked for me and the closer I got to the end, the more I could justify letting the wet laundry sit in the washer a few hours, the dirty carpet go unvacuumed. 

If there is a flaw at all, it's that some of the rich male characters are a little too stereotyped. But most of the characters in this book are so well developed, particularly most of the females (whose points of view are the ones we get most of). The area the story is set in comes alive: the woods, the camp, the danger of the area, the struggle of the locals once the only factory around shuts down. 

I'm pretty darn glad that this one is on my book club's list for 2025. I can't wait to discuss it with them, even if that is months from now. This one is going on my Best of 2025 list, where it will likely remain at the end of the year. 

The Museum of Failures by Thrity Umrigar

The Museum of Failures by Thrity Umrigar

368 pages

Published September 2023 by Little, Brown and Company

Publisher's Summary: 

When Remy Wadia left India for the United States, he carried his resentment of his cold and inscrutable mother with him and has kept his distance from her. Years later, he returns to Bombay, planning to adopt a baby from a young pregnant girl—and to see his elderly mother again before it is too late. She is in the hospital, has stopped talking, and seems to have given up on life.

Struck with guilt for not realizing just how ill she had become, Remy devotes himself to helping her recover and return home. But one day in her apartment he comes upon an old photograph that demands explanation. As shocking family secrets surface, Remy finds himself reevaluating his entire childhood and his relationship to his parents, just as he is on the cusp of becoming a parent himself. Can Remy learn to forgive others for their human frailties, or is he too wedded to his sorrow and anger over his parents’ long-ago decisions?

Surprising, devastating, and ultimately a story of redemption and healing still possible between a mother and son, The Museum of Failures is a tour de force from one of our most elegant storytellers about the mixed bag of love and regret. It is also, above all, a much-needed reminder that forgiveness comes from empathy for others.

My Thoughts: 

This is the sixth of Umrigar's books that I've read; any new book she writes will automatically be added to the TBR list. Why? Because I can reliably count on her to write books that explore relationships - between parents and children, between spouses, between friends. Because she writes complex characters with empathy. Because she tackles complex social issues, particularly class and gender. And because she always teaches me more about the country of India and Indian culture. 

The Museum of Failures gave me all of those things. 

One reason Remy has spent so little time in India since going to the U.S. was the idea (initially introduced to him by his beloved father who urged him to get out of India) that, as a country, it is a museum of failures; failures that are all too obvious to Remy when he visits. The other reason is his relationship with his mother, who has always been cold and distant, even cruel at times. 

When he arrives in India to look into adoption (his American wife believes they should adopt a baby from India so that it looks more like one of them), he discovers that his mother has been admitted to the hospital and is very ill. The cousin he pays to look out for her doesn't appear to have been taking care of either his mother or her apartment. His frustration mounts when the young girl who was going to let Remy and his wife adopt her baby backs out and with the care his mother is receiving in the hospital. 

In dealing with all of these situations, and surrounded by old friends,Remy learns a lot about himself, his family, and his country. But there is a cost to be paid for what he learns when a long buried secret is revealed; now he must learn to forgive and understand. 

There's a lot going on in this book and a lot of introspection on Remy's part. Sometimes he felt like too much, too many complications in one place. And I have to admit that I wasn't wild about the ending, which just seemed a bit too tidy for me. But Umrigar's books are always satisfying reads. I love reading about this culture with all of its many facets. Here, Umrigar, as ever, makes readers see that you have to truly know someone and what they've been through in life to understand them. 

Life: It Goes On - March 2

Happy Sunday! Cold here today; but the sun is shining, so I'm trying to pretend it's warm outside. Heading out shortly to go visit friends so that illusion will be shattered shortly. 

Celebrating our girls this weekend - Miss H and Ms S share a birthday on March 1. This year I decided to have flowers delivered to both of them. Yesterday discovered that Miss H was out of town so not home to get her flower delivery. Then I got a call from the florist in Alaska saying that they didn't get any response when they knocked to delivery Ms S's flowers! Thought I'd managed to deliver flowers the only year that both deliveries were going to end up frozen on the front step! Fortunately, got Ms S's delivered and Miss H had a friend come and get hers before they froze so they will both get to enjoy them. Miss being able to do birthday celebrations around the dining room table like we used to do! 

Last Week I: 

Listened To: I finished Jennie Field's The Age of Desire and started Bill Clegg's Did You Ever Have A Family? Not to far into that one yet, so the jury's still out. The Age of Desire suffered from being too long and following in the footsteps of The Hunter, which was so well read and such a good book. 

Watched: A lot of college basketball, The Voice, and a whole lot of stuff that's unremarkable.

The Magic Candies

Read: Raced through The God of the Woods and loved it. Now I'm finishing Isola by Allegra Goodman. Then I'm on to Lian Dolen's latest, Abigail and Alexa Save the Wedding. 

Made: Mac 'n' cheese and beef and bean enchiladas. Been managing to make enough each time I cook to get a few meals out of each thing. 

Enjoyed: Went to dinner with friends and then saw the Oscar-nominated animated shorts. Think we all agreed that some of them were a little strange and none of them really wow'd us, but it was still a good night!

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This Week I’m:  

Planning: Will be having family descend to celebrate my dad's 90th birthday toward the middle of next week, so this week will be about getting the house cleaned and food ordered for that. 

Thinking About: There are a few small projects that I want to get down in the next week so I'm pondering how to get those done. 

Feeling: Frustrated - we were so close to spring last week and now we're looking at snow in the forecast this week. I know, I know - it's only March, but ya girl was really loving not having to wear a coat. 

Looking forward to: Fingers crossed that this will be another quiet week. 

Question of the week: Are you watching the Oscars tonight? We're not going to get home in time to watch the red carpet, which I'll be sad to miss. Hopefully in time to watch some of the awards.