Wives and Daughters

I watched the BBC miniseries first and then I decided to read it.    It is unfinished since Gaskell died but the reader can pretty much figure out what happened afterward.  It is the story of Molly Gibson whose widowed father marries again.  Although she doesn’t get along with her stepmother that great Molly does get along with her stepsister Cynthia.  Cynthia manages to catch the fancy of the guy that Molly Gibson has a crush on Roger Hamley.   However, Cynthia has a past and it manages to come back and harm her.  I noticed that the stories behind the Hamley family weren’t as told about in the British miniseries.  It’s too bad about that.  I liked the novel overall.  This was my first Gaskell book.  I read The Bronte Myth earlier which criticized Gaskell for feminizing Charlotte Bronte.  I’m glad I took a chance on Gaskell anyway.  4/5

Pictures of Hollis Woods

Hollis’ foster mom Josie is experiencing Alzheimer’s so Hollis fearing she’ll be taken away runs away with her.  Hollis remembers when she lived with a loving family that worked except an accident scared her away.  Ultimately Josie needs care and everything in the book is resolved nicely.  Although this book was predictable, the characters seemed real and were likable.  You root for the main character.  This won the Newberry Honor.  

A Solitary Blue

This is the story of Jeff the guitar player in the Tillerman books.  His mother abandoned him when he was young.  She’s trying to get back in his life somewhat.  However, she’s cruel and manipulative.  He just wants to stay with his father, a professor.  Dicey from the previous Tillerman cycle book doesn’t come into the last third of the book.  It turns out that Dicey and Jeff have more in common than what was assumed in the previous books.  This was a good book although I have to admit I was hoping for the focus to be more on the Tillerman family.  

Expensive People

Joyce Carol Oates really knows how to start a novel.  She begins this book with the narrator saying that they are a child murderer meaning that they are a child who does murders.  This book shows the character as he goes to private school and his home life.  Joyce Carol Oates decides to include a short story in the middle of the book which I thought came across as a bit awkward and showed less focus on the novel itself.  The specific murder did come across as somewhat of a surprise for me although I should have seen it coming.  I’m more impressed by her short stories but I’m going to read more of her early novels.