Like the 4 Stars say, I really liked it.

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Despite all the excellent reviews, I ignored this book for months because I thought it would be too depressing for my taste, after reading the top 2 reviews on Amazon. I'm glad I finally took a chance on it. Let me say first, if you don't mind the minor spoiler, that this isn't tragic at all--very angsty, yes but it ends on a positive note.

Joan, a forty year old married paralegal with two kids, goes home to her recently deceased mother's house to settle her affairs. While cleaning out her house, she discovers a hidden stash of letters written by her mother but which were never sent out. The emotional and passionate contents of the letters come as a shock to Joan, as all her life, her mother Kate had never been anything but cold and distant.

Her interest piqued, Joan proceeds to investigate the hidden identity of her mother's lover and the circumstances of their love affair. The story goes back and forth in time from the present 1997 to the past (1930s to 1960). The alternating timelines sync perfectly as Joan slowly uncovers the mystery in the present while the author takes us back in time to the beautiful but ill-fated love developing between Kate and her lover. All the while, Joan has to contemplate her own very serious predicament, where any decision can have far-reaching consequences not just for herself, but for her family as well.

This book truly deserves the over a hundred five star reviews it got on Amazon. The characterizations are spot-on, from the brash feminist Annie, to the headstrong but ultimately conformist Kate, to the very conflicted Joan. Their stories are compelling and reflective of the times in which they occurred. The period settings feel authentic. But none of that will make an entertaining book without the ingenious plotting that holds everything together.

A perfect 5 stars!

P.S. Good books like these always make me think too much. And mulling over things sometimes throws up plot holes or some other incongruities. I can usually ignore them but in this book, a couple of important things bothered me a bit. Do not read if you haven't read the book, as these spoil the ending. 1. The entire premise of the book rests on Kate becoming a 'cold' and 'bitter' woman because she lost the love of her life and had to live with a man she hated and a child she didn't want. But when the final reveal is shown, Kate does gets her HEA, when Joan was just 5 years old. So why didn't that totally life-changing event change Kate for the better? 2. I can't believe how the author resolved Joan's predicament. Its the mother of all cop-outs! Using an accident to conveniently solve all her problems so Joan didn't have to make a hard choice? I know the author was probably trying to make Joan look better in our eyes, but come on, we're not purists! :)








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this got going better once i got further into it, but my overall feeling, while kind of liking the book, is still disappointment. there are too many contrivances, and the switch between past and present isn't seamless - or balanced, more time needed to be given to the present to make this novel what it could have been - and just overall didn't live up to the hype about it.

as i write that about not enough of the book taking place with joan, in the present (although from a story perspective this was fine as she was close to insufferable), i start to realize what my main issues with the book are. the joan chapters were pretty necessary to the book to tie it all together, but the story that moran wanted to tell was katherine's, in the past. and her chapters read better, more easily, and were better written and were more engaging. joan's chapters were what felt contrived and i think it's because even moran didn't care too much about telling her story. she was there as a device but not as a character who was part of the story. or so it felt to me.

there are other things that bothered me - that so much of the book was predictable as you go along (i even saw the ending, although i didn't know how she was going to get there), that so much of it seemed to be written as an attempt to hide things from the reader (at the expense of reality - people wouldn't behave the way they did, except in order to be able to structure the book as it was structured) or divulge things to the reader at a specific pace. (there are other ways to do this, i believe, that flow better or feel more natural.) that katherine's personality after 1960, and her relationship with joan, are kind of inexplicable to me considering the resolution of the book.

still, i enjoyed reading the katherine chapters, even as i was frustrated with both her and annie throughout.

this isn't a bad book by any means, it's just not as good as it could have been or i wish it was (or i was told it was). ( )