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Red Ruby Heart in a Cold Blue Sea by Morgan Callan Rogers

Posted on January 28, 2012
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Reason for Reading:
  • The title – such an interesting one!

I recommend:

  • Gods in Alabama by Joshilyn Jackson

Summary from GoodReads:

A captivating debut, introducing a spirited young heroine coming of age in coastal Maine during the early 1960s.

When her mother disappears during a weekend trip, Florine Gilham’s idyllic childhood is turned upside down. Until then she’d been blissfully insulated by the rhythms of family life in small town Maine; watching from the granite cliffs above the sea for her father’s lobster boat to come into port, making bread with her grandmother, and infiltrating the summer tourist camps with her friends. But with her mother gone, the heart falls out of Florine’s life and she and her father are isolated as they struggle to manage their loss. Both sustained and challenged by the advice and expectations of her family and neighbors, Florine grows up with her spirit intact. And when her father’s past comes to call, she must accept that life won’t ever be the same while keeping her mother vivid in her memories. With Fannie Flagg’s humor and Elizabeth Stroud’s sense of place, this debut is an extraordinary snapshot of a bygone America through the eyes of an inspiring girl blazing her own path to womanhood.

My Review:

This book charmed the heck outta me.  Right away, while reading a description of a time long past, a coast I’d never seen, and a girl and her mother making a spontaneous trip, I fell in love.  Red Ruby Heart in a Cold Blue Sea is the perfect coming-of-age story for an older generation of women, and for the younger generation as well so they can get a glimpse of what life was like.

Here’s what I love the most about this captivating little story.  There are no neat endings, no tidy wrap-ups, and no cliches.  Instead there is heartfelt emotion, and it’s raw.. and it hurts, and I wanted to rage right along with Florine at the unfairness of life – but bravo to Rogers for making life unfair, because that’s what made this book real.  It was so real I could smell the salty air, and I could see the hot tears on Florine’s face, and feel her rage as she acts out against the adults in her life, you know – the adults who actually stuck around for her.

When I first finished this book, I sat it down and I looked at it and I thought.. that was okay, but .. do I want more?  And now that I’ve had time to sit back and think, to let the story settle, I am really, really appreciating this story for being the gem it is.

Don’t just take my word for it! Check out what these bloggers say!

Chicks Dig Books

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Blessings by Anna Quindlen

Posted on August 6, 2011
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Reason for Reading:
  • I picked this up as a bargain buy because Anna Quindlen never lets me down.

I also recommend:

Summary from GoodReads:

Late one night, a teenage couple drives up to the big white clapboard home on the Blessing estate and leaves a box. In that instant, the lives of those who live and work there are changed forever. Skip Cuddy, the caretaker, finds a baby girl asleep in that box and decides he wants to keep the child . . . while Lydia Blessing, the matriarch of the estate, for her own reasons, agrees to help him.

My Review:

Anna Quindlen is one of those authors who holds the power to knock the socks off of me.  Every time I go to pick up one of her books I know that, at some point, I’m going to end up in tears – so I have to pace myself accordingly.

Blessings was no different.  While it didn’t contain nearly the same amount of tragedy some of Quindlen’s other books have (Yes, Every Last One, I’m looking at you), it still had some heartbreaking moments, but, in true Quindlen style, I knew that these characters would be strong enough to overcome it.

Blessings is the story of a family, an unlikely family, but complete with all of the past wrong-doings, mistakes, loves and hurts that a “normal” family might have.  This family consists of a Korean housekeeper, an 80ish year old woman, and a convicted felon groundskeeper… and one tiny, helpless baby.  Of course, there is also the house, which is filled with history and memories and can’t be left out of the mix.

I was completely charmed by Charles “Skip” Cuddy and his treatment of the unlikely turn of events that culminated in his finding a baby in a box on the steps of “his” barn.  I held my breath through each hurdle and ached for him as he learned the correct way to care for the child, and, when the end came (as it always does in these types of stories), my heart ached for him.

Blessings is a story of redemption, unlikely love, strength of character where there was none before and of making the right choices, no matter the pain involved to those making those choices.  I thoroughly enjoyed this book and found it did wonders to “reset” me after reading a few bad books in a row.

Check out these reviews!

Margo: Out and About

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