DCL Book Chat

In The Third Miracle – An Ordinary Man, A Medical Mystery and A Trial of Faith, Colorado author and journalist Bill Briggs does an amazing job of telling the story of handyman Phil McCord who worked at a convent in Indiana and had a mysterious eye ailment after having cataract surgery. One cold day he was walking across the grounds and soon found himself inside the chapel. He prayed to Mother Theodore Guerin and God for help in having a cornea transplant or just help with this ailment. The next morning, his eye was so much better that the doctors were perplexed. They did not understand it.

But the Sisters of the Convent said it was the intervention of Mother Theodor Guerin who they had been championing to become a saint. McCord soon regained his 20/20 sight. The Catholic Church was investigating alleged miracles that Mother Guerin was said to have been part of and 100 years from the first alleged miracle – this one took place.

Briggs interviewed McCord, the nuns and explored the rigorous court drama and what he called almost a CSI Vatican way of how they name saints. The book reads like a mystery novel complete with drama, amazing characters like Mother Theodore and Phil McCord, the Church and the Vatican. Think – Erik Larsen Devil in the White City – The Third Miracle will capture your attention and is hard to put down.

Lisa

The Uncoupling is a book about sex. Or rather, it’s a book about no sex. In the sleepy suburban town of Stellar Plains, New Jersey, a spell has come over the women who work at the local high school. They feel an icy chill and they suddenly no longer have any desire to engage in sex. The very thought is repulsive. This cold wave happens to coincide with the staging of that year’s school play, Lysistrata, the ancient Greek comedy where the women of Athens decide to withhold sex until their men stop fighting the Peloponnesian War.

If you can let yourself embrace this magically-realistic premise, Wolitzer’s story puts an interesting spin on how sex and our love or hate of it can affect a relationship. The spell knows no bounds and we hear from, among others, a formerly passionate spouse; a teen in the thrall of new love; a disaffected partner resentful of hurtful remarks; and a serial-dating single. These different voices give the story a well-rounded perspective. As the characters exam their sex lives, they examine their whole lives and their place in each relationship. They consider intimacy at all its levels. Wolitzer’s writing style is easy to read and she is spot on with describing certain elements of high school life and suburban living.

The ending of the story is, perhaps, a bit predictable and heavy on the mystical, but the body of the story is entertaining and thought-provoking enough to carry the reader through.

Laura J.

Once again Colorado’s Sandra Dallas has written a wonderful historical novel. The Bride’s House is set in Georgetown, Colorado. It’s the story of three generations of women who live there. It starts out during the 1880s mining boom and bust and continues past WWII. Three strong-willed women are the main characters: Nealie, the red-headed runaway; her daughter Pearl, the intelligent, business-minded, lonely one and Nealie’s granddaughter, Susan, who is the first one who attends a university. The other main character is The Bride’s House. It’s more than three love stories. It is a history of the area, of women, and it’s about secrets and how secrets harm families, loves and friendships. Sandra does excellent research on all her books. It was a joy to read. The Bride’s House is really located in Georgetown, but it isn’t open to the public.

Lisa

Julia Glass won the 2002 National Book Award for Three Junes. In this her fourth novel, she writes a funny, moving and thought provoking story revolving around a curmudgeonly 70-year-old retired Harvard librarian. Percy Darling’s wife, Poppy, died suddenly 30 years ago. Now, his staid, solitary lifestyle changes dramatically when he allows his older daughter, Clover, to renovate his barn and turn it into Elves and Fairies, a preschool for the wealthy families who live in their suburb outside Boston.

Other characters whose stories unfold and intertwine with Percy’s are his other daughter Trudy, a renowned Boston oncologist; her son Robert, a premed student at Harvard who gets involved with an eco-terrorism group; and Sarah, whose son Ricco attends Elves & Fairies and to whom Percy forms an attachment. Others include Ira, Ricco’s gay teacher and Celestino, a Guatemalan gardener, who Percy meets while Celestino is tending Percy’s neighbor’s garden.

I would recommend this book to discussion groups and to readers who enjoy Elizabeth Berg, Joyce Carol Oates and Anne Tyler.

Allison