There are always places in the world where folks live and work the whole year through but that are so attractive that the more affluent come during their most beautiful seasons, temporarily make them their own and then pack their bags and go away. The mountains in winter bring the ski chalet people, lakes in summer bring the cottage and boat people, and islands in the sun bring them, too. Generation after generation they come, interact but don't MIX with the locals, sometimes pal around with the young ones, if they are attractive enough and then go away and forget it all until the next season. These seasonal folks think of the place as much theirs as that of the locals, sometimes even more theirs and in many ways lord their ownership over the ones they leave behind.

And sometimes, especially among the young, romance blooms and even a true love. Both of them know that it is a summer thing but once in awhile the love is real and the romance continues although as secretly as possible. And sometimes that love leads to secrets and unhappiness and causes tragedy that ripples out through families, relationships and the years. This is such a story and it is written in such a compelling way, alternating back and forth from the earliest onset of new young love to the years after and back again. There is mystery for all the secrets are not revealed at once and the reader turns the pages rapidly hoping to find them. And like an onion or the tissue paper surrounding a shiny new toy, the author uncovers each bit, slowly, increasing the desire in the reader for the revelations. Some are euphoric, some sad, some tragic, some surprising, others inevitable but in the end, when all the pieces are out there, resolution and the hope for happiness.

I read this book until the wee hours, slept a bit and woke up to finish it. Haven't done that with a book for a long time!

2017--Marisol Ferrera's grandmother has just died and left a request that Marisol return her ashes to Cuba, the place of her birth. Marisol has never set foot in Cuba but Elisa has filled her head with stories of Havana and the life led by the sugar plantation rich Perez family.

1958--19 year old Elisa Perez is an affluent debutante in Havana. She and her two older sisters rule the society of the Batista regime. But there is discontent among the poorer Cuban society and many young people are joining one revolutionary group or another. Fidel Castro is one of the most successful in gathering young men around him determined to overthrow Batista and spread the wealth of the many, like the Perez family, among the many more impoverished on the island.

1959--The Perez family leaves Havana for Florida.
The story is told in alternating voices of Marisol in present day Cuba and Elisa in the days of revolution. Today's Cuba is much, much different than the place of her grandmother's stories. Indeed, it is much, much different than the people who followed Castro imagined it would be.

What was interesting to me was the sense that Marisol considers herself Cuban, though her father and she and her siblings were born in Florida. Spanish was her first language and in times of stress she thinks and prays in it. It is with amazement that she finds herself unable to relate to the actual place although she experiences a sense of homecoming upon first arriving at Jose Marti airport. I kept wondering where the melting pot of lore and the assimilation that I experienced as a granddaughter of German and Irish immigrants.

My German forebears did not have to leave Germany--it was well the rise of Hitler or even WW I. My Irish grandmother didn't have to leave Ireland--the famine did not happen during her lifetime. Yet, they would not teach their children their native languages, since English is spoken here. There were not lengthy stories of the old country and my parents had no longing to go to Europe and see the old home. I appreciate my German and Irish heritage but don't consider myself to be either. It would be nice to travel to those countries but don't have a desire or need to see where they grew up. I found these same feelings to be true in the kids I grew up with who had the same heritage and even those of Italian and Puerto Rican backgrounds. So, is it because the Cuban immigrants felt forced from their homeland that they have never given up that expectation of next year in Havana--even those who had never, ever spent last year there?

Though the story is fascinating, the characters all well drawn and inviting, the description of place in both eras colorful and beautiful, that inability to discern the lack of assimilation and melting into the American pot nagged throughout.

It would appear there is to be a follow up story of Elisa's sister, Beatriz. Unlike the gentle Elisa, she is quite the flashing eyed, daring older sister. I look forward to her tale.

The story takes place on an island --Avalon, the first symbolic trope of the novel--located off the coast of New York's Long Island--maybe another. The white daughter of a prominent executive of the main industrial and economic entity on the island--Grudder Aviation, manufacturer of war planes and polluter of the island ( Grummond?)--returns to claim her inheritance. She brings her Harvard educated husband, with an advanced degree in landscape architecture, and her two children with her to live in The Castle--royalty! He is, in addition to being educated, also black! Doesn't take long for the author to introduce all kinds of viewpoints, real and supposed, on race relations. In addition to this woman, Leslie, her husband, Julius, her son, Brooks and little daughter, Eva, we are introduced to the coterie of men and women who were friends of Leslie's parents and grandparents--all very shallow and all very proper and all very rich. All a big façade of perfection.

There are also the younger generation, the teens of the island--the rich pampered teens of the East end where the Castle is located; the poorer, though not necessarily poor, children of the blue collar workers at Grudder, located on the West end, where these kids live. Naturally, never the twain shall meet--although a West end guy married one of the East end princesses and produced the two main teen characters Maddie and Dominic, Dom for short.

Once upon a time, when choosing colleges, Marymount was on my list--Leslie would have been entering college about the time I graduated in '63. The description of her time at Marymount is total fiction and, if it is not, then I am truly happy I opted for Mt St Vincent, where I was not forced to live like a nun with required Mass attendance and prayer times. But, at any rate, Leslie was repressed as a young woman--is it any wonder she broke out of the mold she was expected to inhabit.

Back to the teens--Leslie brings the two groups together, allows them the run of the ballroom at the Castle and their story devolves into sex, drugs and rock and roll--or metal, or grunge or whatever it was they were blasting all the time all night into the dawn. Are they the ones responsible for the recent vandalism --the graffiti sprayed throughout town that accuses Grudder of causing death and cancer in the community?

I've not read this author before but she seems to have a good reputation as a writer. In this instance, I just think she tried too hard to bring too many current issues into one story line. As a result she didn't do any of them justice. The shotgun approach diluted the points she was trying to make. As a result the reader is thoroughly confused and repelled. The whole story takes place within one summer --but what a summer--it is one with a huge infestation of Gypsy Moths. Their eating, defecating and crawling everywhere is the background music of the piece, adding to the heightened tension of the story. This, too, was terribly overdone--actually quite disgusting.

It was hard to get into this book--it was superficial and too symbolic at every turn. None of the characters was appealing and none of them mattered enough to care that the ending was supposed to be tragic. That it seemed the author wanted the reader to care was a bit sad--she just filled it with too many things to care about and so none of it mattered. Like the islanders at the end of summer, it was just good that summer was over and so was the book. Was so disappointed.

Could not put this book down, literally inhaled it in one and a half days! Only took time out when it was impossible to stay awake. The prologue takes place in the visitors' room of a jail in Illinois. A retired policeman has come to visit an inmate, soon to be paroled, as he has for ten years, every two weeks. The inmate, 31 years old, has served the ten years for having murdered a fellow classmate at Dellecher Classical Conservatory, a small but prestigious school devoted to the training of thespians, dancers, artists and writers. The inmate had been one of seven fourth year actors--the only seven left after four years of culling lesser talented would be Shakespearean performers. The visitor is the policeman who investigated the death of one of the others. He is not satisfied that this particular player is the one responsible and he has come for the last visit, hoping to convince the inmate to tell him the whole truth of the tragedy that befell the seven in the last year of their studies.

And so begins the telling, by Oliver Marks, of the lives of seven young people finishing the training that would, hopefully, lead them into successful lives and careers as Shakespearean stars. There are the three girls: Wren, as small and delicate as her name implies: Meredith, the red - headed, sexy, but insecure temptress; Filippa, the level-headed, unflappable but detached somehow dependable friend to all. And there are the four boys: Richard, the robust, tall, deep -voiced who is always the lead male in any of the plays they perform; Alexander, the pot smoking lesser player; James, the delicate, almost pretty gentle soul; and Oliver, James' room-mate, best friend and usually the best friend of the play's hero, as well.

We follow them through the course of the year, right to the death of one and the imprisonment of another, as Oliver takes the policeman, Joe Colborne, and us back ten years in time and back to Dellecher to relive the year and its events. Told in scenes in each act, it is as though the curtain has lifted and all the players have returned. What happens in this play is funny, heart-breaking, warm, sad, youthful, wistful and tragic--it is Shakespearean, it is true to life and yet, it is somehow not exactly real--the players are isolated from the reality of the outside world--but then, aren't all kids in school, until they graduate to the true everyday reality of the rest of the world?

The most highly developed character in the book is Two Oaks, the great yellow mansion built by Gray Neeley in 1850's St Jude, Ohio. The house hums and stretches and leans and listens and groans. It is alert to the shadowy humans of the past who lived in it or partied in it and it vaguely senses the presence of the new tenant, Cassie Danvers, the despondent, depressed twenty something who has come home after the death of the grandmother who raised her, June.
In an effort to explain Cassie's mind set and to explain the brooding mansion's decrepit state the author toggles back and forth between the present, 2015, and the past, 1955, the days of June's teens and the time of St Jude's fifteen minutes of fame as the setting for a mediocre Hollywood shoot of the film, Erie Canal. Unfortunately, this flashback approach dilutes the author's ability to develop the characters of these parallel plots.
The description of St Jude and its surroundings as well as its buildings is excellent and the reader can easily envision the locale. It is also easy to see the changes in the place over the intervening sixty years. The excitement of small town folks invaded by Hollywood stars, their entourages and crews is very real. Unfortunately the sense of place does not create a sense of the inner workings of the main characters.
Also difficult to discern is the relationships among some of the characters. There are many threads introduced in the 1955 sections that are left hanging tantalizingly over the readers' heads, much as the ceiling rotting in an upstairs closet hangs threateningly over the temporary residents of the 2015 Two Oaks. Perhaps, the story would have been better told in two volumes--one before--the 1955 story with the secrets revealed--and one after--2015--with the living discovering them and making sense of the situation in which they find themselves.
I read the book in one day, almost giving up several times with impatience but pushing on in hope that with time I would find something redeeming and deeper in the story. Finished disappointed and with a sense of something lacking.

I received a free copy of this book from Blogging for Books for review.

It was just too hard to really get the rhythm of this book. Run on sentences almost too hard to follow and characters not at all appealing. After about a week of seriously trying to make progress, it was just not worth the effort. Unless one is an absolute lover of the convoluted writing of the 19th century liberally sprinkled with polysyllabic words, this is not the book for you.

Two young people heading into the next phase of their lives with no idea of what the future will bring. Not unusual. Hopeful, nervous with a touch of joy. The human condition. One, a young woman, not yet 30, with her new husband. Leaving Tahiti in a small plane for a couple of days to explore the final resting place of a favorite singer, Jacques Brel. The other, a man, mid-thirties, in a business suit, having rushed right to the airport from the office he has decided to escape. He wanted to be an artist, he followed a safer path to Wall Street. Now, he, too is taking a side trip to explore the final resting place of Gauguin.
During the flight they encounter stormy weather, the pilot decides to skirt around it, the plane is struck by lightening and goes down. The pilot is killed instantly. The would-be artist, Barry Bleecker finds himself swimming distance from a small island, which he manages to reach. It would seem he is the only survivor and though he is at first at a loss, he soon decides to make shelter and hope for rescue by a passing boat or an overhead plane.
In the meantime, the bride, Sophie Ducel, holds her dying husband in her arms in the fuselage of the plane, until he is wrenched from her arms by a shark and taken deep into the sea. She finds an inflatable raft with a bag of survival materials and pulls herself out of the sinking plane. Within days, delirious, she washes ashore and is found by Barry.

And so begins the true story of these unlikely castaways. How they manage to survive, physically, emotionally and mentally in total isolation on an island small enough to walk around on an evening stroll is an absorbing story. It is full of all the stages of a developing relationship--getting to know you, disagreements, compromise, thoughtful gifts, humor, teasing, insults--culminating in a partnership of depth and caring. As the reader looking in you are sensitive to their fear, frustration, hope and love and you care deeply for them and root for their survival and ultimate rescue.

I read the book in one day and at the end, understood the title and was content with the final result. Though a bit sad.

A long book that was as chaotic and confusing as the events it portrayed. Difficult to read because of excessive repetition of place names and numbers of people marching, shouting, killing, looting, starving, raving, randomly shooting and then seemingly returning to " normal " before starting all over again. The narrative is interspersed with quotes from various observers of the actions during the February 1917 uprising followed by observations during the finality of the October revolt. Most of the observations are either by Red leaning foreign correspondents and photographers sent by their publications to report on the events, or by people on a mission to " help " one faction or another such as Mrs Pankhurst come to organize the Russian women who have now achieved freedom. There are also letters between diplomats and their governments or letters to family back home.
So many questions--where are the young girls displaced from the elegant Smolny Institute? Were they murdered --were their bodies among the many described as fallen on the street or in the hallways of various palaces? How is it that the streets are swollen with soldiers who left the front ( there is after all a war going on) yet other trains are headed to the front with soldiers? Where are the trucks laden with food and arms coming from and where did the food go if people are lined up in the streets listlessly waiting for food at the shops? How does one determine that there are thousands marching in the streets and not hundreds? With all the shooting and so many loose canons among these throngs how is it that in one instance there are only seven killed, in another only eleven?
One thing for certain--there was chaos and anarchy. The only ones doing any successful planning were the Bolsheviks, even with struggles for power within the ranks. The resentment against money was great and reminds me of the present day criticism of the 1 in general and the Koch Brothers in particular. Also similar, demands for higher wages and less work--increases to three and four times their wages and reduction to a four hour work day was not sufficient to satisfy these revolutionaries. Murder, rape, looting were all on the rise--rape on college campuses, ambush of policemen sitting in patrol cars, looting and riots in the streets--all very familiar.
But, one must wonder, is the result of the Russian Revolution--suppression of speech and religion, total central government control --to be the result here, too? And if that comes, will it happen in the span of less than a year? 2017 is the publication date of this book, to mark the centennial of that Revolution--will it mark, with a new President, no matter which, the beginning of ours?

There are places where the story drags and others where the story is repetitious but overall it is a fascinating story. It begins in 1939 when the City becomes aware of the German threat but during the lull when the Germans are gracious and cultured and polite. Soon things begin to change and the food shortages begin and Jews are rounded up and made to wear yellow stars, Jewish companies are arynized and their owners flee or to into hiding.

Many French men have already gone to unoccupied France to fight in DeGualle's army, what few are left are gathered up and sent to work in Germany for the war effort. Left behind are the women and children, whom they need to protect and feed. The choices made by the women are unbelievable--some resist, some depart and others collaborate--some even collaborate while also resisting. All of the stories are heart-breaking and over and over I asked myself, what would I do, would I be able to survive some of the horrors , how would I protect my child?

Once liberation comes the story is far from over. All of the women who survived, no matter how, now had to face the future--for some a very short future, with death the result of trials that found them guilty of treason, or the result of illness and weakness resulting from years spent at the hands of brutal German imprisonment. Yet, others lived into their nineties and they, too, found their future shadowed by the years of the war and its aftermath. Perhaps the most impressive line in the book is its last:"It is not for the rest of us to judge but, with imagination, we can try to understand."

As this was an advance reading copy the pictures which will be in the published edition were lacking and that is sad, for the captions of the empty spaces indicate that they will greatly enhance this story of the incredible women who lived through the German occupation of Paris and the rest of France during WW II.

Although the blurb by Elizabeth Gilbert calls this " a smart, romping, hilarious novel", I will agree with the smart. At times it hardly romps though it does move relatively fast and only once did I laugh loudly and long; toward the end of the book.

Despite the, in my opinion, misleading endorsement on the front cover, directly above the lovely illustrated heroine, the story is well done and interesting. Based on the true story of a dye manufacturer's spoiled son and his careless collision of his automobile with the horse drawn carriage of the Kopp sisters on the streets of Patterson, NJ in 1913, it is an old-fashioned crime story using the newspaper accounts, letters and trial transcripts of the event.

Since this plot would be rather thin and could be covered in far less than the 400 pages of the novel, Amy Stewart, the author has invented a secondary plot of a factory girl, taken advantage of by the aforementioned spoiled son, whose name by the way is Henry Kaufman. Lucy Blake gave birth to the child and kept him but when the dye workers went on strike she had to give him up temporarily to others and when the strike was broken the child had disappeared.

Constance Kopp, as the eldest of the three Kopp sisters takes it upon herself to write to Kaufman asking for the $ 50 dollars that it cost to have their carriage repaired. Kaufman ignores the letter and so Constance takes other measures, which leads to harassment by Kaufman and his unsavory cohorts. Against the better judgement of Norma, the second Kopp sister, Constance engages the help of the local sheriff, Bob Heath.

She also encounters Lucy Blake and becomes obsessed with finding Lucy's child, since she believes Kaufman and his sister, Murial Goldfarb are somehow responsible for the child's disappearance. Heath cannot help in the search because not only won't Lucy speak to him, but once her tenement is burned down she has disappeared, too.brbrThe adventuresome and headstrong Constance makes forays into New York and meets a photographer who now works on police and private investigations. In the meantime, Norma, who is content to remain on their farm and work with her pigeons and avoid all involvement with the outside world is less than encouraging. The third sister, Fleurette, is a precocious 17 year old with a vivid imagination who is thrilled at all the activity and treats it as a great adventure.

All of the characters are very well developed, although I'm not sure about the relationship between Sheriff Heath and Constance. We find midway through the book that he is married but there are strange undercurrents in their interactions. Particularly amusing is James Ward, the family lawyer for the Kaufman family, although he is a minor character who only appears twice in the story--once almost without making an impression.

The time period is nicely depicted and I love the use of words that my Mom used to use and which I haven't heard in years and years, such as chiffonier.

All in all, not the run of the mill mystery--and certainly a fun read. This was a complimentary copy from BookBrowse in return for my participation in a readers' discussion that begins on May 10.

Received this book from BookBrowse, an online book club, to read and then discuss starting on Feb 18. I found the story interesting sometimes but at other times long and drawn out. The first part of the book, especially, was slow moving and I really didn't understand the ending at all.

While the situations of the three girls who form the central characters of the " good " people were fairly well defined, the girls themselves were not well developed. The second part of the book then took off and the plot was moving smoothly and much of the confusion of the first part was cleared up. Yet, eventually, the plot began to drag again and my interest waned. The " evil " plotting characters were even less defined, especially Sophie.

There was much background information missing--such as, how was it possible Tanya fell in love with and became engaged to the handsome American? We never saw very much of him. How did Sophie and Morel meet? Were Maud and Yvette romantically involved? And why did Robertson make the two American characters so brusque and somewhat less refined than the Russian, British and even the street urchin, Yvette?

All in all it was an okay read, but not a book I'd find myself recommending to friends or rereading. For that matter, it will probably not be one I'll even remember in the next few months

Just as in all his books, Erik Larson does his research and spins a tale of non-fiction as engrossing and interesting as any novel. His main character in this one is the elegant, stream-lined, grayhound of the seas, HMS Lusitania. She is a tragic figure, populated with the rich and influential, traveling to England for varied reasons from reunion with family to making business deals likely to make them richer and more influential. There are also the more modest passengers, enjoying a bit of opulence as they travel to Europe. brHere, too,is the Captain--Turner, who has worked his way through the ranks of the Cunard company to command this fastest ocean liner. All of these people are entering an area around Ireland that Germany has declared a war zone. Indeed, the German government has taken out an ad in the New York papers warning that any ship in the zone, neutral or otherwise, is fair game for her U-Boats, patrolling the area.

Nevertheless, the ship heads out of New York Harbor, planning on running up a US flag on its mast when in the war zone and docking safely in Liverpool, most likely escorted by British naval vessels for protection.

Larson takes us through the New York preparations of the ship, through the boarding of passengers, to the embarkation and across the Atlantic. We meet several of the passengers and learn of their sea water baths, their lavish dining, the quiet strolls along the decks, the laughter of children, and evening entertainments. As we travel with her, he also takes us to the claustrophobic atmosphere of a German U-boat, captained by a leader every bit as experienced and capable as Captain Turner, Walther Schwieger. Here we learn of the dangers and tribulations of life on a torpedo laden dweller of the deep, blind to its surrounding when submerged and open to detection when it is not.

The closer the two ships come to each other, the greater the tension that builds until Turner shifts the angle of the Lusitania along the Irish coast and Schwieger lines up the torpedo he will loose into her bow. As it finds its mark under the disbelieving gaze of several of its passengers, U-20 after one last glance at the devastation, makes its way to the open sea and the Lusitania begins its journey to the bottom of the ocean, where it will come to rest within 15-20 minutes.

And during those final minutes, Larson again takes us among her passengers until at last, the living are rescued and the dead are laid to rest.

I would suggest if you wish to know more about some of these people that you read another book--Lusitania by Greg King and Penny Wilson. Between the two books, the full story of the ship and her human mates arises from the mists of over 100 years.

Not really sure how to rate this book. Have always heard about the great torch that Sinatra carried all his life for Ava Gardner and that her having an abortion without telling him was the final blow to their marriage. Well, it seems she had two abortions from him and the author doesn't give any indication that this upset Mr. S at all. Guess they did stay in touch, sort of, through the years and according to Brady they even toyed with the idea of reuniting a couple of times. Still, love or passion are not the things that came to mind as I read of these two. Obsession, lust, convenience perhaps. But then they both seemed to have the same feelings and connections with quite a few other " great passions." In many ways I wish I hadn't read the book--didn't need to know how many of these people shared each other's former wives, girlfriends or ships passing in the night. The most sensible sounding of all the people quoted about Ava was Charlton Heston. She was basically a pretty souse who had low self-esteem and thought getting beat up by her beaux was normal. Sinatra being more public and making headlines is not revealed any more in this book than in those stories. All in all, glad I didn't pay for this Hollywood tell all rather than the documentation of a great devotion and love that I expected.

That's how my Dad used to describe the encounters we have with others as we all pass through our lives. In the case of The Fishbowl these encounters are just as fleeting but are experienced by a goldfish who made the instinctive leap toward the surface of his bowl only to escape its watery confines and find himself rushing headlong from the balcony on the 27th floor of his building toward his doom on the cement sidewalk below.

The imagery of the author's description of the apartment building's construction, the goldfish view of a cityscape from his bowl, the analogy of the building as a living organism are all enough to keep the reader interested. But to this wonderful interweaving of words and language he has added the lure of an almost voyeuristic glimpse into the lives of some of the apartment dwellers. Through them the individual boxes that comprise the building come alive.
He wanders back and forth among them but each of their stories begins as Ian, the goldfish, passes the floor on which they live. And being a goldfish, the initial glimpse is short and not very deep. After all gravity is pulling this little guy down to earth rather rapidly and, in addition, the brain of a fish is not exactly highly developed. So, as quickly as the scene makes an impression, it is lost and the fish cannot remember where he is or what is happening. A reoccurring refrain on his part is " what was I doing?" Not unlike the preoccupied musing of people in apartment buildings when their routine is interrupted by a brief encounter with another of its residents.

The author amazed me with his observational skills and his ability to describe so well various aspects of the story. I also loved his mind wandering to things like the amino acids of DNA and the concept of terminal velocity in Ian's descent. And at the end, the summation that shows how much can happen in people's lives in a very short time span and how little control they have over much of what happens.

I loved the book because I grew up in a six floor building with no elevator and no parking garage in Manhattan. Two towers with four apartments on each floor--48 boxes in all. Probably knew the occupants of about ten of them but really KNEW and interacted with those in only four. This story truly resonated with me and got me thinking back to that time 50 years ago and wondering what stories were being lived by all those neighbors.
All in all, for such a short book, an enjoyable and thought provoking read.

Almost everyone in the world knows the story of the tragic collision of the Titanic and an iceberg in the North Atlantic. This is the story of an equally elegant ship populated by equally affluent and influential people sailing in unbelievable opulence in the opposite direction during a period when most of the Western world was at war. Here, then, is the Lusitania, the fastest ship on the seas, sailing under the guise of American neutrality from New York to Liverpool, through the Irish Sea and the war zone in which lurked German U-Boats.

On May 7, 1914 the commander of U-20 ordered the release of the torpedo that would send Lusitania to the bottom of the ocean within 15 minutes! That event, however, just a little over a hundred years ago, comes at the midpoint of this engrossing little book.

The authors begin the tale by setting the scene for us financially: a good motor car that would cost $1000 then, would in today's dollars cost $23,000. They provide a cast of characters, whose names and personalities are very familiar to the reader by the time the first explosion that rocked them and their late lunch, with portholes open to allow the lovely Spring breeze to enter the elegant rooms under an almost cloudless blue, sun drenched sky eleven miles off the shores of Ireland.

The writing's tone draws the reader into the early days of leisurely sailing with multiple changes of clothing, promenades and reading and lounging in deck chairs, writing letters, eating fabulous meals with strangers who become temporary friends, and following the social admonitions of Emily Post throughout. Yet, for some, there is some apprehension --the possibility of attack and the apparent lack of safety measures causing concern.

When the torpedo does come the reader, just as the passengers, experiences the shock, but disbelief that the ship will sink, through the fear, and panic and frantic reactions. We are carried overboard to be pulled down in the ship's suction only to bounce up. floating under an impossibly beautiful sky in freezing water. Eventually, some are saved and the authors take us ashore with them to the little town of Queensland and the beach where those who died wash up.

We are carried through the political manipulation of the story and then in an epilogue, we revisit the survivors to find what their lives became after the tragedy. It is such a well written book that the story seems as current as any in this morning's newspapers. The men and women and children--the passengers--the Captain and his officers on the Lusitania and even the Commander of the U-Boat are three-dimensional and real.

Anyone who enjoys the stories of the Edwardian Age and all its apparent splendor, who is fascinated by the social and technological changes of the early 20th century and who is interested in great human tragedies will find this book extremely rewarding and a fast read. It is, however, a book whose story lingers and brings home once more the fact that all the money in the world cannot protect mere mortals from overwhelming events and that some of the poorest of the poor can manage to survive them.

At the outset, let me say that the premise of this book is excellent and that overall it is interesting. There are, in my opinion, some shortcomings. The bawdiness of the Nurse ( Angelica ) is probably more historically accurate than I realize but still at times it seemed rather jarring. In many instances I found the repetitiveness of the grief for the loss of her sons, of her many lustful romps with her husband , of her interactions with the Franciscan priest very irritating. Enough so in Part I that I almost stopped reading the book. Part II, once Juliet was grown and had more impact on the story than suckling Honey Nurse's breast, was far more interesting. Though, here too, the rhythm of the story would once more get bogged down in the repetitiveness of the earlier themes. In Part I a slight uneasiness with the obsession of the Nurse with Juliet arose but in Part II it caused actual distaste when the relationship became so intense that it felt almost incestuous. This closeness was less stressed once Tybalt's anger and Juliet's aroused interest in young men began to influence the story.
The strength of the story lay in the glimpses of the young Mercutio and Tybalt, in the development of the character of Paris, and in the wonderful character of Angela's husband, Pietro. The ongoing thread of the beekeeper theme carried the story from the early days of their marriage and his gifts of honey comfits, through the tragedy of Juliet's death, to the final days of Angela, alone.
Anyone who loves Shakespeare's play will enjoy Angela's story and though it slumped at times, over all I'm glad to have read it and would surely recommend it to others, whether or not they've read the original. I think it would incline those readers to go to the play as it encourages me to return to it.