This is my second read for the Southern Challenge, it featured lots of Southern food which was making my mouth water as I was reading it, fried shrimps and grits (whatever they are!).
The Mermaid Chair is Kidds second novel after writing the bestselling The Secret Life of Bees - which I loved but can't remember a bit of. This book will be the same, it was a good read for the last two rainy afternoons but it will slip out of the memory pretty soon.
Jessie is woken one night by a phone call, her mother has puposefully chopped off one of her fingers. Jessie rushes back to her and her childhood home, a place of ghosts and memories which she has avoided for years.
The return home (as happens in many novels), sparks doubts about her present life and reveals truths from the past. Within hours of being there she has fallen in love with a monk in training and figured that her mother chopped her finger off because of her guilt over her husbands death.
The novel is set on an unnamed island off the coast of South Carolina. I think it was the islands quirky characters which made this book more enjoyable, their is Kat and her daughter Benne - a woman with a childs mind, Hepzaith who speaks Gullah the language of the slaves, a mermaid shop I wanted to dive into, a few charming monks and Max the dog who seems to belong to every islander.
Challenges:
The Southern Reading Challenge
A-Z (Author)
2 comments:
The mere mention of food has me salivating and desperate to read it. I just love books that talk about food. I still have The Secret Life of Bees to read, best get a move on!
Yes all that food. Yum! It's great to see other reader's thoughts on a book I have just read and I agree, a good simple story.
Now, what to read for the third book - in the next week!
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