This book was bought to send to lukutuoli as a birthday RABCK. I hope you enjoy it.

Thank you so much, my Birthday RABCK Buddy, raeliz64! I received this present today with Easter chocolate eggs and a birthday card. Can´t wait to read this!! I´ll remember this surprise in August, when it´s your time to celebrate!

From Publishers Weekly
"Starred Review. Jessie Sullivan, the protagonist of this rewarding second novel by the author of the bestselling Secret Life of Bees, is awakened by a shrilling phone late one night to horrifying news: her mother, who has never recovered from her husband Joe's death 33 years earlier, has chopped off her own finger with a cleaver. Frantic with worry, and apprehensive at the thought of returning to the small island where she grew up in the shadow of her beloved father's death and her mother's fanatical Catholicism, 42-year-old Jessie gets on the next plane, leaving behind her psychiatrist husband, Hugh, and college-age daughter, Dee. On tiny Egret Island, off the coast of South Carolina, Jessie tries to care for her mother, Nelle, who is not particularly eager to be taken care of. Jessie gets help from Nelle's best friends, feisty shopkeeper Kat and Hepzibah, a dignified chronicler of slave history. To complicate matters, Jessie finds herself strangely relieved to be free of a husband she loves—and wildly attracted to Brother Thomas, né Whit O'Conner, a junior monk at the island's secluded Benedictine monastery. Confusing as the present may be, the past is rearing its head, and Jessie, who has never understood why her mother is still distraught by Joe's death, begins to suspect that she's keeping a terrible secret. Writing from the perspective of conflicted, discontented Jessie, Kidd achieves a bold intensity and complexity that wasn't possible in The Secret Life of Bees, narrated by teenage Lily. "

This was absolutely one of the best books I have read this year, I liked it very much! I want to have this book in my permanent collection, but I´ll start a Finnish book ring, if there are others, who like to share this book with me!


EDIT 27.04.2006:
Vien kirjan viikonloppuna ruzenalle Hämeenlinnaan.

EDIT 19.04.2007:
Ringissä mukana toistaiseksi
1)ruzena (Hämeenlinna)
2)dotdot (Helsinki)
3)Niksu (Helsinki)
4)chirel (Tampere)
5)em64 (Tampere)
6)chrisim (Tampere)
7)hetku77 (Nokia)

Well navigated, Private Postman!

(Headline Review Paperback 2005, 377 p.)

From the first beginning I liked the way Sue Monk "Nomen est omen" Kidd writes. Her good sense of humor is enjoyable (LOL: Freudian Timex candy story). She creates odd and hilarious characters like Mother and Hepzibah, in addition to the solid main characters. She paints beautifully the small community with pretty surroundings.

Yet halfway reading the book I was about to skip; the story was turning out to be a plain lousy love story and not even well written. I was glad I didn't give up, because the rest of the book was a true pageturner.

Thank you lukutuoli - Sue Monk Kidd was an acquaintance new to me. The chair will move house to dotdot.

-ruzena

The Mermaid Chair arrived today, thanks to everyone:)

And to ruzena: Erikoiskiitokset Optimistista. Yhden sen jutuista on kirjoittanut vanha kuvaamataidonopettajani ja toisen isäni vanhan kaverin tytär. Maailma ja etenkin Häme on niin kovin pieni. :)

Kiitos jatkoajasta, lukutuoli:)

I finished The Mermaid Chair finally! For some reason I didn't want to leave it, even it was a disappointment to me from the beginning. Thank you for being so patient with me, lukutuoli. The Mermaid Chair reminded those paintings of Jessie's. It was a cute little set in a box. Some elements of the set were familiar from The Secret Life of Bees: religion, saints, religious artefacts, nature, wisdom of black women and close connection between women, but something was missing. I'm sorry to say I found the story tame and characters lame. The only thing that made me finally read the book was Jessie's mother. I also wanted to know.

Niksu will get the book on next meet-up.

Got it at our monthly meetup today. Thanks dotdot!

I finished this yesterday. It was quite ok but not as good as Secret life of bees which I liked a lot. I was annoyed because somehow I felt the maincharacter naive at times. Especially in the lovestory part.

This story reminded lots of other books I have read lately. Quickly thinking Joanne Harris: Coastliners, Kristin Hannah: Summer Islands, Sue Miller: While I was gone and even Chuck Palahniuk: Diary.

Thanks to lukutuoli for letting me part of the ring. I have already PM'd chirel and I'm waiting to get the address.

Rakuna visited Tampere today and gave me a pile of BC books to distribute to local BCers. If it takes longer than expected to meet chirel, maybe I'll manage to squeeze in :-)

*****

[09/11] OK, so I did't have time for this after all... I passed the book on to chirel at the Tampere November meetup.

I decided to not finish this book (on page 8...). There was something about the language that made it impossible for me to follow the story. It felt like the narration was slanting somehow. I felt like in a funny house full of optical illusions and weird floors unable to move naturally. This really was a dissapointment and a big surprise as The Secret Life of Bees was so capturing I read it in just two days. If there'll be a translation, Ill give this book another try one day.

Home to lukutuoli in todays meeting (I hope...)

Joined this bookring yesterday at the monthly meetup. Will start reading soon.

I had heard quite a lot of not very enthusiastic comments on this book and have to admit they did affect me a bit at the beginning. It was bit of a struggle to get started. The story got better but it was not as captivating as it could have been. Perhaps the biggest flaw was that Jessie was so unsympathetic; nothing else mattered to her except what made her feel better. And the two sweet men in her life, they just couldn't be a match to her. The story was ok, so I'm not unhappy that I decided to join the ring.

Will give the book to chrisim next time I'll see her, maybe in the meet-up in January.

I got the book from yesterday's meeting. Fortunately I'm the last reader of the book ring. Thank you lukutuoli for sharing!

It seems that (again) I've kept a book for ages. I started to read it during my sick leave in February then wanted to read and do something else. I finished reading in beginning of April...

I didn't like much Jessie. It was hard to symphatise her what came into her love problems. The mother issue was more interesting. The mystery in her past was the hook of this story. Anyhow I was disappointed when the sad secret reavealed. The friendship of "three Egreteers" was affecting - especially when Nelle isolated herself and the others still cared for her and wanted all the best for her.

At last the book will be returned to lukutuoli! That is today in our monthly meeting in La Famille.

19.4.2007 I took the book home with me from monthly meeting in La Famille. I liked The Secret Life of Bees very much, so I'm quite curious what will this book be like.

24.1.2010 At long last I had time to read this book. Like a few others already mentioned earlier The Secret Life of Bees was much better, but this was okay as well. I recall seeing a movie based on this book, which was a bit tacky. I found Jessie a bit hard to relate to and she seemed a bit self-centred. Or the reasons for her quest for self-awakening weren't spelled out clearly enough. But I liked other elements in the book - the island, the monastery and the friendship of the three women.

The bookring is finally closed and I got this book back at our local BC meetup this evening!

Hippolein had this book on the wishlist and so it will travel next to him as a part of the Finnish Hippa-ketju (wishlist-tag-game of the Finnish BC-forum).

The book arrived today in Helsinki, thanks lukutuoli!

Funny, just got yesterday at the meeting in Helsinki "The Secret Life of Bees" by the same writer, now the trouble is, first read this one or start with the Bees ??

When looking for the next book to read, I first came across this one, so I'm reading it before the "Secret Life of Bees".
Have to tell I liked the book, managed to read it in one go yesterday (good Sundays are there to make it possible, and a cold to keep me away from all the other things I should have done). The main character is perhaps not that easy to feel sympathy for, but the environment and the other persons are very well described. I felt sorry for the poor monk at the end, hoping it would have turned out better for him after all.
Glad I read this book, gave me the idea to speed up my "Aakkoshaaste" still a bit, you never know what wonderful books I still have lying at home waiting to be read ;)

The book goes next to teddyke!