What Was She Thinking? Notes on a Scandal by Zoe Heller

This was an interesting and well-written book, witty and with some good musings on female relationships (even though the "main" relationship in the story is between a 14 year old boy and his art teacher)

I didn't know Zoe Heller before but she is certainly a British author. You can just tell sometimes, when you are reading a British female author (even though I hate to make generalizations.

I whizzed through the book and thoroughly enjoyed it!

I found out that this book was short-listed for the Man Booker Prize in 2003!

Here's a bit from the Reading Group Guide:

At the center of the scandal is the obviously named Bathsheba Hart, a naïve pottery teacher at St. George's Academy in London. Mobbed by undisciplined teenagers and cowed by teachers' lounge politics, Sheba befriends a fifteen-year-old remedial student named Steven Connolly. At first she is drawn to him because he is one of the few students who does not terrorize her. He has a talent for drawing, and in several after-school sessions she encourages his artistic tendencies, exposing him to the work of Degas and Manet. Soon, however, their relationship leads to trysts behind the pottery kiln and secret rendezvous in Hampstead Heath.
Their affair and the ensuing media frenzy it ignites are recounted by Barbara Covett, a lonely history teacher who craves Sheba's friendship. Barbara is a catty narrator, disdainful of her students and suspicious of her colleagues, and her observations and petty critiques of her surroundings are feisty, witty and endlessly entertaining.

Last Bus to Wisdom by Ivan Doig

I have always wanted to read something by this author and when this book (his last before he died) became available on Digital Content through the library, I grabbed it up.
I started off really loving the book but have to say that my interest waned as the story progressed.
It is very well written and the characters are alive and zany, but the content of the story did not keep my interest throughout.
Here is a part of the NYTimes review.....the review was very favorable

Donal, raised by his grandmother on a Montana ranch, finds himself packed off to relatives in Manitowoc, Wis., when Gram takes ill. The boy sets out the old-fashioned way: He’s a lone wolf riding the dog. “And here I was,” he recalls, “stepping up into what I thought of as the real bus, with GREYHOUND — THE FLEET WAY TO TRAVEL in red letters on its side and, to prove it, the silver streamlined dog of the breed emblematically running flat-out as if it couldn’t wait to get there.”

The journey passes pleasantly enough, thanks to the huge cast of characters hopping on and off. Nuns and drunk shepherds, cops and cons, Korea-bound soldiers, dreamy waitresses and burly Indians, “they all filled in the dizzying span of my thoughts like a private version of ‘Believe It or Not!’ ”

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

I can certainly see why this book is on everyone's "BEST" list this year. Not only is it a great read, but it's so damn relevant!

The Fall Guy by James Lasdun

This thriller, suggested by a good friend, was a fast and fun read.  Here's what it says on Amazon:

It is summer, 2012. Charlie, a wealthy banker with an uneasy conscience, invites his troubled cousin Matthew to visit him and his wife in their idyllic mountaintop house. As the days grow hotter, the friendship between the three begins to reveal its fault lines, and with the arrival of a fourth character, the household finds itself suddenly in the grip of uncontrollable passions. As readers of James Lasdun’s acclaimed fiction can expect, The Fall Guy is a complex moral tale as well as a gripping suspense story, probing questions of guilt and betrayal with ruthless incisiveness. Who is the real victim here? Who is the perpetrator? And who, ultimately, is the fall guy? Darkly vivid, with an atmosphere of erotic danger, The Fall Guy is Lasdun’s most entertaining novel yet.

Commonwealth by Ann Patchett

This was a fascinating book that was a little hard to get used to at first. (My husband was reading it at the same time as I was - a little behind me actually - and he had the same issues at first.)
I didn't know that the story would jump around so much and I had to go back a bunch of time to figure out who was who and when everything was happening.

From the NYTimes:

Like “Bel Canto,” the best-known of Patchett’s six earlier novels, “Commonwealth” starts with an unexpected kiss at a party — in this case a kiss at the christening party for the infant Franny. Because the kiss in “Bel Canto” happens at the exact moment the party is overtaken by terrorists, it’s tempting to wonder if Patchett means to imply with “Commonwealth” that family is its own longer-term hostage situation: The embrace at the christening party between a man and woman married to other people leads soon enough to multiple divorces and remarriages. Patchett follows the two semi-connected families for the next 50 years, as the children become adults and the grown-ups become old.

After I read the book I listened to a podcast from KCRW (Bookworm) which changed my thinking about the book - but didn't change my enjoyment of it!

The Red Car by Marcy Dermansky

I'm not sure where I heard about/read about this little book, but I am sure glad that I learned about it. It was a short, little book, perfect after having just finished  The Nix.  I needed something short and sweet, but I am not sure that you can call The Red Car sweet. It packs a punch in those short 206 pages.  Here's a quote from Daniel Handler in the NY Times Book Review that says it well:

I slammed down “The Red Car,” Marcy Dermansky’s sharp and fiery new novel, in tense fits and jumpy starts, putting down the book to ponder it, but not pondering long because I had to know what happened next.

 I read this in two sittings and then went back and re-read some parts, because there really is a lot to digest in those 200 pages. I am going to look at Dermansky's other work!

The Nix by Nathan Hill

This LONG book really kept my attention. The story line drifted in time periods but was held together quite well by the characters, for the most part. There were times when I lost track of who was who and had to look back to reacquaint with the story and characters, but that didn't bother me.
Here is a synopsis from Westchester Libraries:

The Nix is a mother-son psychodrama with ghosts and politics, but it's also a tragicomedy about anger and sanctimony in America. . . . Nathan Hill is a maestro." —John Irving From the suburban Midwest to New York City to the 1968 riots that rocked Chicago and beyond, The Nix explores—with sharp humor and a fierce tenderness—the resilience of love and home, even in times of radical change.It's 2011, and Samuel Andresen-Anderson—college professor, stalled writer—has a Nix of his own: his mother, Faye. He hasn't seen her in decades, not since she abandoned the family when he was a boy. Now she's re-appeared, having committed an absurd crime that electrifies the nightly news, beguiles the internet, and inflames a politically divided country. The media paints Faye as a radical hippie with a sordid past, but as far as Samuel knows, his mother was an ordinary girl who married her high-school sweetheart. Which version of his mother is true? Two facts are certain: she's facing some serious charges, and she needs Samuel's help. To save her, Samuel will have to embark on his own journey, uncovering long-buried secrets about the woman he thought he knew, secrets that stretch across generations and have their origin all the way back in Norway, home of the mysterious Nix. As he does so, Samuel will confront not only Faye's losses but also his own lost love, and will relearn everything he thought he knew about his mother, and himself.

I think this book could have been shortened by about 100 pages. I would have left out the parts involving the video games.... but maybe that dates me and says something about my generation. It may be crucial to the story of a person 20 years younger.

Today Will Be Different by Maria Semple

From the LA Times:

“Today Will Be Different” has a simple premise: Eleanor Flood, a wealthy, middle-aged Seattle resident with a penchant for negativity, decides to be better. She sets seemingly reasonable, attainable goals that actually hint at her need for a total life overhaul and personality change: to be a better wife and mother and friend and human being. Told in the span of one day, with a few well-placed flashbacks, “Today Will Be Different” reminds us that self-improvement is gradual and way more difficult than we’d like for it to be, even under the best of circumstances."

I liked this book but not NEARLY as much as the other by Maria Semple that really hooked me:  Where'd You Go, Bernadette?"

Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue

I liked this book a lot.  Read about it here:

From Westchester Libraries

This heartfelt and intimate portrayal of African immigrants trying to make it in New York City around 2007 focuses on the family of Jende Jonga from Cameroon. He lands a job as a chauffeur for a wealthy finance industry boss and is then able to bring his wife, Neni, and their young son over from Africa. Neni enrolls in college and is hired as a cleaner and nanny for the family for whom Jende works, and they become more involved with these super-rich people who have problems of their own. As the Wall Street financial crisis deepens, Jende loses his job, and their application for asylum is rejected. The incredible pressures of poverty, limited opportunities, and the grind of New York City and an uncertain future stress the family to the breaking point as a new baby is born and they struggle not to lose sight of their dream. -Mbue's debut portrays these individuals realistically and sympathetically as the stresses of surviving in New York City lead to marital difficulties and physical confrontations. VERDICT A fast-paced, engaging read with an interesting cross-cultural background.

Another Brooklyn by Jacqueline Woodson

This is a short and beautiful book. I finished it in a couple of sittings and wanted to start all over again.

Why the title? I think the Washington Post reviewer got it right!

Woodson reminds us that this was, indeed, another Brooklyn, far from the tony borough of multi-million-dollar brownstones and speciality grocery stores. Heroin addicts wobble along these streets. A prostitute who lives beneath August’s family loses her children to Social Services. “White people we didn’t know filled the trucks with their belongings,” August remembers, “and in the evenings, we watched them take long looks at the buildings they were leaving, then climb into station wagons and drive away.”

Every Kind of Wanting by Gina Frangello

I heard about this book on one of my podcasts and thought it sounded really interesting....and it was, but I really didn't like any of the characters very much, so I had a hard time engaging with the story.
Having just gone through the experience of having a surrogate carry my son and daughter-in-law's first child, I was attracted to the story, but this story is SO DIFFERENT from that in my family. Thank God!
Here is what the Westchester Library says about the book:

Every Kind of Wanting explores the complex intersection of three unique families and their bustling efforts to have a "Community Baby." Miguel could not be more different from his partner Chad, a happy-go-lucky real estate mogul from Chicago's wealthy North Shore. When Chad's sister, Gretchen offers the couple an egg, their search for a surrogate leads them to Miguel's old friend Emily, happily married to an eccentric Irish playwright, Nick, with whom she is raising two boys. Into this web falls Miguel's sister Lina, a former addict and stripper, who begins a passionate affair with Nick while deciphering the mysteries of her past. But every action these couples make has unforeseen consequences. As Lina faces her long-hidden demons, and the fragile friendships between Miguel and Chad and Nick and Emily begin to fray as the baby's birth draws near, a shocking turn of events-and the secret Lina's been hiding-threaten to break them apart forever. By turns funny, dark and sexy, Every Kind of Wanting strips bare the layers of the American family today. Tackling issues such as assimilation, the legacy of secrets, the morality of desire, and ultimately who "owns" love, the characters-across all ethnicities, nationalities, and sexualities - are blisteringly alive"--

But, here is my favorite quote in the book:
"Our children are never ours. We belong to them, but they belong to themselves.  They belong to people not yet born."

Mischling by Affinity Konar

I wanted to love this book, after hearing it reviewed on All the Books Podcast, but I can't say that I did. The poetic nature of the writing distanced me from the characters and seemed to "pretty" in light of the subject matter. The book deals with two twin girls' experiences at Auschwitz under Mengele's "care." His interest in twins is notorious and this book took the reader right into his "Zoo" (laboratory)
The ending also seemed a little too "pat" for me.
I guess the book didn't stand much of a chance, either, for me, because I had just finished A Gentleman in Moscow, which is certainly my favorite bookfor the last year or so.

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

I just finished the Neapolitan Novels and loved them, but I must say......A Gentleman in Moscow is the BEST book I have read in a really long time.  Now, it doesn't hurt that it's about Russia and that Russia plays a HUGE part in the story - at least for me, but beyond that the story, the writing, the ambiance, the wit, the suspense...it's got it all. I couldn't stop reading and I didn't' want it to end.

The story starts with Count Rostov's trial, where he is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol Hotel (where he happens to reside anyway!), but his quarters are now much more sparse and hidden up in the belfry. That doesn't stop this man from assimilating to the new life and making the most of it.  

His friendships with various hotel staff and his relationship with Nina, a young girl he meets at the beginning, are told with wit and intelligence.  He maintains a friendship with a writer he met in his university days, who has since become a dissident writer.  Count Rostov dines each evening with good wine and excellent food, despite the shortages and lace of good ingredients.  The novel presents such a great image of what life was like in the early days of the Soviet rule and how over time there is an easing of the ways of Marxism and Socialism.  

On the New York Times Book Podcast I heard this referred to as a Russian spy novel. That could not be further from the truth in my eyes.  Yes, at the end there is some intrigue and covert goings-on, but they have little to do with politics and more to do with the Count getting his way!

READ THIS BOOK!

The Story of the Lost Child by Elena Ferrente

Wow, I finished the four books. AMAZING. I do really want to go back and read the first one again.

Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay by Elena Ferrante

This is the third novel in the Neopolitan Diaries and I loved it....for the most part. There were sections that were a bit slow for me, but overall, you get a great sense of how Lina and Lenu evolve over time and become themselves.

The Story of a New Name by Elena Ferrante

I have Ferrante Fever!  Just finished Book #2 and now MUST read Book #3. I think I liked the second book more than the first, but it also made me want to go back and re-read My Brilliant Friend. I had no idea on how dependent the books are on each other. Usually in a series, the author doesn't require the reader to know much about the prior books and will fill in the details of the story. Not true here!
In the first book I got so many of the characters, other than Lila and Lenu mixed up. That continued for a point in in this book, but it started becoming more and more clear who the "important" characters are and how they are all interconnected and interrelated.

This paragraph from the New York Times defines the special realationship of these two characters very well:

The novel begins with Elena throwing Lila’s notebooks into the Arno after Lila has entrusted her lifetime of writing to her best friend. About to publish a novel and graduate from Pisa’s prestigious Scuola Normale Superiore, 22-year-old Elena can’t bear to read of Lila’s love affair with Nino Sarratore, the young man she believes Lila stole from her. But the act of sabotage has deeper, darker roots. Elena has always feared that Lila, although poorly educated and stuck in Naples, is more brilliant than she, that Lila is the real writer. These two love each other ferociously, but each burns with a desire to outdo the other, sometimes killing what is best in her soul mate.

"Eligible" by Curtis Sittenfeld

Curtis Sittenfeld has updated "Pride and Prejudice" into an entirely enjoyable and humorous escape novel that I LOVED reading! She brings in timely topics such as health care, transgender and interracial relationships, CrossFit,  artificial insemination,  and reality TV.  The characters are sometimes comic-book like, but weren't Jane Austen's as well?
I really like this author and was so excited when the book came out. I wasted no time in requesting it from the Library and couldn't wait to get it.
I was inclined to re-read Pride and Prejudice right after but now that I finished Sittenfeld's book, I don't want to spoil the experience by diving into the original right away.
If you like Jane Austen, read this book. If you like Curtis Sittenfeld, read this book! And if you haven't read Pride and Prejudice, I am not sure you should read it!

The Girls by Emma Cline

This was an enjoyable, but difficult book. It's a fictional retelling of what it was like to be one of Charles Manson's girls during the Summer of Love. Some of the characters are drawn upon real people and I am assuming, Evie, the main character, is too. Here is a piece of the review in the New Yorker:

Evie Boyd, an only child whose upper-middle-class parents have recently divorced, wants to be older than her fourteen years, and is drawn to the free-spirited, rebellious young women she sees one day in a Petaluma park. They are looking for food to take back to the ranch where they live. The novel charts Evie’s accelerated sentimental education, as she is inducted into the imprisoning liberties of free love, drugs, and eventual violence, all of it under the sway of the cult’s magus, Russell Hadrick. In another way, though, Cline’s novel is itself a complicated mixture of freshness and worldly sophistication. Finely intelligent, often superbly written, with flashingly brilliant sentences, “The Girls” is also a symptomatic product not of the sixties but of our own age: a nicely paced literary-commercial début whose brilliant style, in the end, seems to restrict its reach and depth.

Before the Fall by Noah Hawley

This was a great page-turner that I read in about 3 days.  It would have been faster if it weren't for work!
The NYTimes summarizes it well: 

“Before the Fall” is a complex, compulsively readable thrill ride of a novel. On the other, it is an exploration of the human condition, a meditation on the vagaries of human nature, the dark side of celebrity, the nature of art, the power of hope and the danger of an unchecked media.

I was disappointed in certain aspects of the plot/story, but it didn't stop me from poring through this at a fast pace!

The Nightengale by Kristin Hannah

This is a LONG book....maybe too long but a good and compelling story. I had LOTS of time to read on planes to and from California, so it helped the time go by

My Brilliant Friend

One down, three to go in the Neapolitan novels from this enigmatic author.  Loved this book, love the characters, love the writing.....but I have a few other books to read before I continue with this saga

The Book of Unknown Americans by Christina Henriquez

I really enjoyed this book and it was very timely, given the political climate here now, with Donald Trump wanting to send all illegal immigrants home.

In this book, however, the immigrants are here legally, but they are still not really considered Americans and live lives that are extremely difficult.

“We’re the unknown Americans,” says a character, “the ones no one even wants to know, because they’ve been told they’re supposed to be scared of us and because maybe if they did take the time to get to know us, they might realize that we’re not that bad, maybe even that we’re a lot like them.”

Here's a shortened version of the synopsis, from Wikipedia:

Alma Rivera, her husband Arturo, and daughter, Maribel, emigrate from Pátzcuaro, Mexico to Delaware on a visa Arturo obtained through work. Though the couple had a rich life in Mexico, they emigrated in order to send their daughter Maribel to a special needs school after she sustained a head injury. The family find it difficult to adjust as they know no English and Arturo's work picking mushrooms, which was the only work he could obtain legally, is monotonous and degrading. Their lives become easier when they meet the Toro family, who occupies the same tenement building as they do. The Toro parents are immigrants from Panama who have become legal citizens but struggle to get by on one meager income. Celia Toro and Alma Rivera become fast friends. Meanwhile, Mayor Toro develops a crush on Maribel and, after she is sexually assaulted by Garett Miller, a boy at Mayor's school, Mayor becomes protective of her.

The Precious One by Marisa de los Santos

This was a good short read, not a great book.
Here is the description from the Library website:

A novel about friendship, family, second chances, and the redemptive power of love.
In all her life, Eustacia "Taisy" Cleary has given her heart to only three men: her first love, Ben Ransom; her twin brother, Marcus; and Wilson Cleary--professor, inventor, philanderer, self-made millionaire, brilliant man, breathtaking jerk: her father.
Seventeen years ago, Wilson ditched his first family for Caroline, a beautiful young sculptor. In all that time, Taisy's family has seen Wilson, Caroline, and their daughter, Willow, only once.
Why then, is Wilson calling Taisy now, inviting her for an extended visit, encouraging her to meet her pretty sister--a teenager who views her with jealousy, mistrust, and grudging admiration? Why, now, does Wilson want Taisy to help him write his memoir?
Told in alternating voices--Taisy's strong, unsparing observations and Willow's naive, heartbreakingly earnest yearnings.

My Name is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout

Beautifully written, elegant and melancholy story. It's almost a short story rather than a novel.

I can't say it any better than the Claire Messud in her NYTimes Book Review:  http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/10/books/review/elizabeth-strouts-my-name-is-lucy-barton.html?_r=0

Along the Infinite Sea by Beatriz Williams

From Jewish Book Council:

Along the Infinite Sea by Beatriz Williams is a historical romance—with more emphasis on the history. In the setting of early Nazi Germany, the book delves into how someone’s fame, fortune, and forbidden passion can influence relationships. The story alternates between the late 1930s and mid 1960s, flashing back to reveal a mystery of regret and intrigue, keeping readers guessing at what happened until the very end of the book.

 I liked the book despite its sometimes far-fetched plot twists and turns, but I was engaged and eager to find out what would happen in the end. I think I may try other books by Beatriz Williams.

The Past by Tessa Hadley

I really loved this book and want to read more by the author. I am going to seek out her other work.

"The Past. It is the story of a family and a three-week summer holiday in the house they have inherited, beneath whose affable surface run deep currents of tension. Hadley specialises in bright, brittle, defensive women with unsatisfactory love lives and a knack for self‑sabotage.....Here she has created a Chekhovian trio of sisters who love and resent one another. Alice, the middle one, is 46, flighty, forgetful and romantic; Fran, a teacher, is practical and decisive and a mother of two young children, Ivy and Arthur; Harriet, the eldest, is independent-minded and shy, a former revolutionary in retreat from the fray. They are later joined by their brother, Roland, a pop philosopher on his third marriage, in a new white suit. Pilar, the latest wife, is one of two family outsiders, the other being Kasim, moody son of Alice’s ex-boyfriend, who takes an instant shine to Molly, Roland’s teenage daughter."

The Japanese Lover by Isabelle Allende

For me, book started out strong.....I was captivated and enjoyed every page. Somewhere in the middle, my interest lagged a little but at the end I was absorbed again.  The problem I had was with the focus  of the book. Who is the main character? At the beginning, I thought for sure, Irina, the young girl who goes to work at Lark House. She is mysterious and has a past that we only learn about as the book unfolds.  Actually, all of the characters unfold like that.  It keeps the reader interested and curious.  But when Irina nearly disappears in the novel, and the focus becomes just Alma,  I got a little unfocused myself. But Allende does bounce back and forth and Irina's story unwinds as she gets to know Alma's grandson, Seth.
I lost track of who some of the characters were and who they were related to....I think that was the problem with me, but in the end, it all came together for me and I found myself really liking the book, the story, the writing and the characters. A good read!
There is so much history conveyed in this story....Japanese Internment Camps, WWII, Concentration Camps, the French Resistance, Israel's early days, even the AIDS crisis...almost a little too much, but that is the time frame of this family saga.

I'm Glad About You by Theresa Rebeck

"I'm Glad About You is a glittering study of how far the compromises two people make will take them from the lives they were meant to live. "

I enjoyed this funny, but thoughtful book by a woman who is the creator of some TV series, including Smash. 

The Hypnotist's Love Story by Liane Moriarity

Eh.....

This was good at first but the ending was just too "pat."

Ellen, a hypnotherapist, is involved with Patrick who has lost his first wife to cancer, has a son from that marriage and has an ex-girlfriend who is stalking him!

She also happens to be a client of Ellen, the hypnotherapist.  Aspects of this story were interesting and amusing, but in the end, it did not pan out for me. 

The Marriage of Opposites by Alice Hoffman

From Alice Hoffman's Website:

Growing up on idyllic St. Thomas in the early 1800s, Rachel dreams of life in faraway Paris. Rachel’s mother, a pillar of their small refugee community of Jews who escaped the Inquisition, has never forgiven her daughter for being a difficult girl who refuses to live by the rules. Growing up, Rachel’s salvation is their maid Adelle’s belief in her strengths, and her deep, life-long friendship with Jestine, Adelle’s daughter. But Rachel’s life is not her own. She is married off to a widower with three children to save her father’s business. When her husband dies suddenly and his handsome, much younger nephew, Frédérick, arrives from France to settle the estate, Rachel seizes her own life story, beginning a defiant, passionate love affair that sparks a scandal that affects all of her family, including her favorite son, who will become one of the greatest artists of France.

I enjoyed this book, I haven't read a Hoffman book in a long time. This one was especially enjoying because it was based on the true story of Camille Pissaro, the French Impressionist.

I recommend this highly.

The Prize by Jill Bialosky

I enjoyed this novel a lot, even though a lot of the people in it are despicable.
Edward is an art dealer who is dealing with a lot of anguish from his past.  A father with bipolar disorder, an ex-wife who died tragically - and he feels responsible.
All of this in the midst of the "art world" - showy, shallow, fleeting.
Here is a synopsis from WLS:

What do we prize most? Are integrity and ambition mutually exclusive, as we seek a place in the world? How do we value, ultimately, a piece of art — or a life? These are the questions at the core of the evocative new novel by New York Times bestselling author Jill Bialosky.Talented, successful, blessed with a loving wife and daughter, Edward Darby has everything a man should hope for. With a rising career as a partner at an esteemed gallery he strives not to let ambition, money, power, and his dark past corrode the sanctuary of his domestic and private life. Influenced by his father, a brilliant Romantics scholar, Edward has always been more of a purist than an opportunist. But when a celebrated artist controlled by her insecurities betrays him, and another very different artist awakens his heart and stirs up secrets from his past, Edward will find himself unmoored from his marriage, his work, and the memory of his beloved father. And when the finalists of an important prize are announced, and the desperate artists maneuver to seek its validation, Edward soon learns that betrayal comes in many forms, and that he may be hurtling toward an act that challenges his own notions about what comprises a life worth living. A compelling odyssey of a man unhinged by his ideals, The Prize is as well an unflinching portrait of a marriage struggling against the corroding tide of time and the proximity to the treacherous fault line between art and money.Inspired by her work as a poet and the need to preserve a private space for the creation of art, The Prize by Jill Bialosky is her most moving novel yet.

Loving Frank by Nancy Horan

This was a fascinating read and I learned so much about Frank Lloyd Wright. I went to school in Madison, WI, recall visiting a FLW home there, but never knew about Taliesan and what happened there. I did visit Taliesan West while in AZ several years ago, and most likely, the story of the Wisconsin house that first held that name was told in the tour of the home, but I didn't remember.

Anyway, there are a lot of themes going on in this really compelling tale and the struggles that Mameh Bothwick endured by choosing love over the comforts of her family life.

Here is an overview from Wikipedia:

Loving Frank is an American novel by Nancy Horan published in 2007. It tells the story of Mamah Borthwick and her illicit love affair with Frank Lloyd Wright amidst the public shame they experienced in early twentieth century America.

The tragic ending through me for a loop because I knew NOTHING about what happened at Taliesan. And I won't tell here!

The Dressmaker by Kate Alcott

This was a fast and fun read about a woman, Tess, who came over on the Titanic...and survived.  I found out after finishing the book that the events are based on true events. There WAS a Lucille who was a designer and who was not quite ethical when safely situated in her life boat after the Titanic disaster.  Found out also that this was a movie....but not much of a hit, and that Kate Winslett played Tess!

Read the Amazon synopsis:

Tess, an aspiring seamstress, thinks she’s had an incredibly lucky break when she is hired by famous designer Lady Lucile Duff Gordon to be her personal maid on the Titanic. Once on board, Tess catches the eye of two men—a kind sailor and an enigmatic Chicago businessman—who offer differing views of what lies ahead for her in America. But on the fourth night, disaster strikes, and amidst the chaos, Tess is one of the last people allowed on a lifeboat.  

The survivors are rescued and taken to New York, but when rumors begin to circulate about the choices they made, Tess is forced to confront a serious question.  Did Lady Duff Gordon save herself at the expense of others? Torn between loyalty to Lucile and her growing suspicion that the media’s charges might be true, Tess must decide whether to stay quiet and keep her fiery mentor’s good will or face what might be true and forever change her future.

Re Jane by Patricia Park

I heard about this book on NPR and just wanted to read it....and I really enjoyed it!

Park's debut is a contemporary retelling of Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre with a Korean American twist. It is the early 2000s in Flushing, Queens, where Jane Re works in her uncle's grocery store after failing to attain a high-powered finance job in the post-dot-com era. Jane, a half-American/half-Korean orphan, doesn't exactly fit in with the residents of the Korean neighborhood where she's lived all her life, and the people around her never fail to point out this fact. Downtrodden from her grocery gig and her uncle's routine emotional abuse, Jane is tempted into an au pair position taking care of English professors Beth and Ed's adopted Chinese child. Introduced to organic foods and 19th-century literature, Jane is both the focus of Beth's feminist lectures and Ed's male gaze. Just as Jane strikes up an affair with Ed, a family death takes her back to Korea, where she begins to wonder if Ed is really the one.