Book Review: Once and Again

I first encountered Rebecca Serle in 2022 with her book, In Five Years. Then, last year, I read One Italian Summer. Both of these books contain cautionary content I would normally avoid, but her writing is so good and stories so intriguing I'm willing to skim that content for the sake of learning from her writing skills. Serle creates wonderful alternative realities. She uses magical realism and plausible conflicts to hone in on truly interesting what-if scenarios.

In this book, Once and Again, the women in Lauren's family have a special coin that allows them one do-over. Before I even knew of this novel, I had actually started writing a short story with this idea but my skills will never match Serle's. She ferrets out the myriad of conflicts this ability would summon: What is significant to warrant the coin's use? Once used, how does one live with the normal inability to intervene in life's trials? Who can be trusted with the secret? Are other lives influenced by the do-over?

My mind thought of the despair if your alteration didn't accomplish what you had hoped. Lauren only learned about the coin at age fifteen, when her mother turned back time to avoid her father's death. Like One Italian Summer, this book considers mother-daughter relationships and the frictions that can develop. The reader cannot help but think about what they would like to do-over if they had such a coin. This was a quick and entertaining read.

Book Review: The Bookshop of Hidden Dreams

I had never heard of this author, and now I cannot remember where I picked up the recommendation. Was The Bookshop of Hidden Dreams offered on Book Bub? I may have been a less-than-motivated reader, so I don't count this against the book, but it didn't enthrall me. With "bookshop" in the title, you assume it will focus a lot on books. Book mentions were minimal. It takes place in a bookshop in the small town of Dove Pond.

Tay Dove is one of seven sisters. Supposedly, whenever seven sisters are born in the Dove family, those women are endowed with magical powers. Tay possesses the unique power (helpful, as she is a historian) to see the scene of writing when she places her hands on handwritten notes and letters. Of course, this comes in handy when you're trying to solve a mystery from the past with primary source documents. When the sisters uncover a tin of love letters, they beg Tay to pick up the trail and solve the mystery of their relative, Sarafina Dove, and her suitor, an alleged train robber, William Day. Rose Day, owner of the town bookshop, offers her grandson's assistance, in hopes that romance may blossom.

You have all the standard details of a mystery: suspicious characters, lost money or treasure, secret codes, and families hoping to learn more about distant relatives. It was an easy read. I just wish it had sucked me in more. Again, my indifference might have stemmed from a reading malaise. When life's circumstances heat up, my mind is more on current issues than on pages passing. I appreciated it as a clean read though (especially as I've turned aside 3 others for content I couldn't get behind). Plus, it receives many 4 and 5 star ratings on Amazon, so others are clearly enticed.

Book Review: One Italian Summer

Every time I read a book set in Italy, I think of my Italian blogging friend Maria Novajosky, author of An Ocean, an Airplane, and Two Countries Full of Kisses. Rebecca Serle's One Italian Summer is a highly entertaining Instant New York Times Bestseller. I loved dropping into Positano, Italy, and reading descriptions of the Amalfi Coast. What's more, I adored the characters in this book. The intensity of this mother-daughter bond was reminiscent of the beloved pair in The Gilmore Girls. Although I was close to my mother, and felt the mother-loss keenly as I read, ours was never as tight as these fictional relationships.

Katy Silver is utterly bereft upon losing her best friend and mother, Carol. Their bond was intense and her grief knows no bounds. Thus, Katy embarks alone on the trip to Italy that the two had planned to take together. Just as in Rebecca Serle's previous bestseller, In Five Years, magic is afoot. Katy bumps into 30-year-old Carol in the town of Positano. Katy is eager to spend as much time as possible with this younger version of her mother. She is learning unknown things from the past, but it brings conflict in her present.

I really enjoyed this book. It held me spellbound for over an hour. I couldn't tear my eyes away. That's saying something, given my current challenges in reading (lots going on and difficult to focus). Thankfully, I read this in hardcover, so I skipped through the brief sex scenes (2 - unnecessary and 1 adulterous). Overlooking that cautionary content, the book is a great exploration into the power of a strong mother-daughter bond. There's a tension in finding your place in the world when motherhood defines you. It may have been more difficult to read about such a loss if my mother had not already passed from Alzheimer's. So, know that up front, if this might be a trigger-warning for you. 

📒 Content Caution: brief sex scenes toward the end of the book

Book Review: Midnight at the Blackbird Café

Author Karen White declares Heather Webber's book Midnight at the Blackbird Café, as "magical realism at its best!" While I found the start a bit slow, once further in I enjoyed this novel. It brims with contemplation of loss and grief, feuds and resolutions, the past and new beginnings. I thought the characters were lovely and the conflicts realistic. When the past threatens to hold us down, we must heal the wounds and start again.

Anna Kate Callow has inherited her grandmother Zee's little restaurant in the town of Wicklow, Alabama, with the stipulation to run the business for a few months before she is free to sell. This is significant because Anna Kate's mother Eden never allowed her to set foot in Wicklow. Her mother fled the town just after an accident killed her boyfriend A.J. Linden. As is typical in a small town, everyone is up in everyone else's business. The Lindens blame Eden and refuse to set foot in the café. That would be fine and dandy, except now A.J.'s sister is desperate for a piece of the famous blackbird pie. They say the pie has magical healing powers and everyone could use a bit of magic now and then.

This would make a great selection for book groups, especially if you're looking for a clean read. You can find discussion questions here and here. Or use the questions the author offers at her website.