Blame by Michelle Huneven (Paperback 304 pp)
Patsy MacLemoore, a history professor in her late twenties with a brand-new Ph.D. from Berkeley and a wild streak, wakes up in jail—yet again—after another epic alcoholic blackout. “Okay, what’d I do?” she asks her lawyer and jailers. “I really don’t remember.” She adds, jokingly: “Did I kill someone?”In fact, two Jehovah’s Witnesses, a mother and daughter, are dead, run over in Patsy’s driveway. Patsy, who was driving with a revoked license, will spend the rest of her life—in prison, getting sober, finding a new community (and a husband) in AA—trying to atone for this unpardonable act.
Then, decades later, another unimaginable piece of information turns up.
For the reader, it is an electrifying moment, a joyous, fall-off-the-couch-with-surprise moment. For Patsy, it is more complicated. Blame must be reapportioned, her life reassessed. What does it mean that her life has been based on wrong assumptions? What can she cleave to? What must be relinquished?
Blame was one of O Magazine's 10 Terrific Reads of 2009.
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer (Paperback 368 pp)
Meet Oskar Schell, an inventor, Francophile, tambourine player, Shakespearean actor, jeweler, pacifist, correspondent with Stephen Hawking and Ringo Starr. He is nine years old. And he is on an urgent, secret search through the five boroughs of New York. His mission is to find the lock that fits a mysterious key belonging to his father, who died in the World Trade Center on 9/11. An inspired innocent, Oskar is alternately endearing, exasperating, and hilarious as he careens from Central Park to Coney Island to Harlem on his search. Along the way he is always dreaming up inventions to keep those he loves safe from harm. What about a birdseed shirt to let you fly away? What if you could actually hear everyone's heartbeat? His goal is hopeful, but the past speaks a loud warning in stories of those who've lost loved ones before. As Oskar roams New York, he encounters a motley assortment of humanity who are all survivors in their own way. He befriends a 103-year-old war reporter, a tour guide who never leaves the Empire State Building, and lovers enraptured or scorned. Ultimately, Oskar ends his journey where it began, at his father's grave. But now he is accompanied by the silent stranger who has been renting the spare room of his grandmother's apartment. They are there to dig up his father's empty coffin. Foer uses nontraditional writing techniques known as visual writing; his style is both loved and hated.
Wifey by Judy Blume (Paperback 288 pp)
Judy Blume's Wifey is a classic, selling 4 million copies since its publication in 1978. Continually in print and in demand ever since, the novel sold 90,000 copies last year alone, attesting to its perennial appeal. And indeed, it's as relevant today-not to mention as funny and moving-as ever. Its heroine, Sandy Pressman-a very nice wife whose boredom is getting the best of her-became the touchstone for a whole generation, and the story of how she trades in her conventional wifely duties for her wildest secret fantasies is unforgettable.Read Judy's new introduction to the book here.
Veronica is hosting the August meeting.
