Idaho by Emily Ruskovich

I started off really engaged with the book and its disturbing theme:  a mother murders her own daughter.  We want to figure out why, what happened, what would cause a mother to do such a horrific act.
So, I kept reading, trying to make sense of it. But I never really did make sense of it. The book got great reviews, but I am sorry that I spent so much time on it. The writing was good, but after a while....I just wanted some answers.  Answers that never came. At least not for me.
I read a review from SFGate which really helped me understand why this book is so beautiful (at least for the reviewer) and I recognize what is special about this book.

“Idaho’s” brilliance is in its ability to not to tie up the threads of narrative, and still be consummately rewarding. The novel reminds us that some things we just cannot know in life — but we can imagine them, we can feel them and, perhaps, that can be enough to heal us. And to do that, Ruskovich reminds us, we need only have “hearts whole enough to know they can break.”

I guess after just having read Eleanor Oliphant, this was a bit too upsetting. I need something uplifting now.

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman

I really enjoyed this book even though it's not a happy story.  The writing is very smart and the author is so good at capturing the character and personality of this quirky young woman. Her take on the "common" things of life is so well articulated; she has had a very "uncommon" life so her perspective on life is very interesting.
Quick Take from Book of the Month Club:  "This is a warm account of one woman’s fight to let go of old hurts and insecurities and make room for self-acceptance and friends."
Kirkus Review:

A very funny novel about the survivor of a childhood trauma.
At 29, Eleanor Oliphant has built an utterly solitary life that almost works. During the week, she toils in an office—don’t inquire further; in almost eight years no one has—and from Friday to Monday she makes the time go by with pizza and booze. Enlivening this spare existence is a constant inner monologue that is cranky, hilarious, deadpan, and irresistible. Eleanor Oliphant has something to say about everything. Riding the train, she comments on the automated announcements: “I wondered at whom these pearls of wisdom were aimed; some passing extraterrestrial, perhaps, or a yak herder from Ulan Bator who had trekked across the steppes, sailed the North Sea, and found himself on the Glasgow-Edinburgh service with literally no prior experience of mechanized transport to call upon.” Eleanor herself might as well be from Ulan Bator—she’s never had a manicure or a haircut, worn high heels, had anyone visit her apartment, or even had a friend. After a mysterious event in her childhood that left half her face badly scarred, she was raised in foster care, spent her college years in an abusive relationship, and is now, as the title states, perfectly fine. Her extreme social awkwardness has made her the butt of nasty jokes among her colleagues, which don’t seem to bother her much, though one notices she is stockpiling painkillers and becoming increasingly obsessed with an unrealistic crush on a local musician. Eleanor’s life begins to change when Raymond, a goofy guy from the IT department, takes her for a potential friend, not a freak of nature. As if he were luring a feral animal from its hiding place with a bit of cheese, he gradually brings Eleanor out of her shell. Then it turns out that shell was serving a purpose.
Honeyman’s endearing debut is part comic novel, part emotional thriller, and part love story.

In the Midst of Winter by Isabel Allende

From the Washington Post: 

The title comes from a line by Camus, who knew something about the oscillations of joy and sadness himself: “In the midst of winter,” he wrote, “I finally found there was within me an invincible summer.” That’s an inspiring sentiment, a hopeful promise to those in darkness and a truism for anyone who has emerged from it stronger. But the challenge for a novelist is how to convey that gospel without trivializing life’s horrors or falsifying the possibilities of happiness.

Really captures the heart of this story, which I really enjoyed so much!  This is a book about unlocking grief and it does it so well. Each of the three characters has its own grief and they are vastly different characters, but all richly developed in the book through their stories that are told over a short period of time, within the context of this "caper." The caper being getting rid of a dead body; sounds crazy but it's all pretty believable when you read this fabulous book!