Like Family by Erin O. White

Like Family by Erin O. White
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and The Dial Press for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!
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Radclyffe, New York, is an idyllic upstate town, nestled in the hills and complete with artisanal bakeries, pottery studios, and hidden swimming holes. Ruth and her wife, Wyn, are living the dream (or Wyn’s dream, at least) with their four children on their small farm, which is also the bucolic gathering place for their circle of friends. It’s a sweet life, but there’s a secret at its center, one that not even Ruth’s best friend, Caroline, knows.

What Caroline does know is that she loves and depends on Ruth, and on the bond between their families. More than anything, she wants her tender-hearted son not to grow up lonely the way she did. Unfortunately, no one can assure her of that, especially not her husband. He just wants things to be easy, drama-free—which is impossible, as he has donated his sperm to his cousin Tobi and her wife so that they could have kids of their own. Now those children are asking unanswerable questions.

After an unexpected death in their community, all three couples are forced to confront the tensions that have long been buried beneath the surfaces of their lives. Richly textured and big-hearted, this exhilarating debut is an unforgettable story of the alchemy of love and loyalty that makes friends Like Family.
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This is a beautiful debut novel that celebrates the nuance and complexity of all types of female relationships. As White leads us on a journey, told through the experiences of one member of each of the three couples at the heart of this story, we are introduced to three different versions of the American family and the impact that an unexpected death in their community has had on each of them. Some of the characters felt at times a bit polarizing, as they were as imperfect and real as the people you meet in your everyday life, but they also resonated strongly with me because this is a book that is written about people of my generation (X), and that is not something I often find. It was a beautiful celebration of female friendship, an acknowledgment of the uncertainties that can accompany midlife (Am I doing any of this right?), and an exploration of the messiness that is family life. However, as I sit here with my thoughts, having just read the last word, I am left thinking about how heart-warming and big-hearted the book was and how much I enjoyed reading it. I hope that it is just the first novel we can expect from this author. This is just the kind of immersive, character-driven writing that I love to fill my bookshelves with.

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The Forget-Me-Not Library by Heather Webber

The Forget-Me-Not Library by Heather Webber
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!
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Juliet Nightingale is lucky to be alive. Months after a freak accident involving lightning, she’s fully recovered but is left feeling that something is missing from her life. Something big. Impulsively, she decides to take a solo summer road trip, hoping that the journey will lead her down a path that will help her discover exactly what it is that she’s searching for.

Newly single mom Tallulah Byrd Mayfield is hanging by a thread after her neat, tidy world was completely undone when her husband decided that their marriage was over. In the aftermath of the breakup, she and her two daughters move in with her eighty-year-old grandfather. Tallulah starts a new job at the Forget-Me-Not Library, where old, treasured memories can be found within the books—and where Lu must learn to adapt to the many changes thrown her way.

When a road detour leads Juliet to Forget-Me-Not, Alabama, and straight into Tallulah’s life, the two women soon discover there’s magic in between the pages of where you’ve been and where you still need to go. And that happiness, even when lost, can always be found again.
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I am of the opinion that nobody writes magical realism as well as Heather Webber. In fact, until I read Midnight at the Blackbird Cafe, which had been loaned to my mom by a friend of hers, I wasn't even really aware that was a genre of literature. However, now I have come to love it, and specifically Webber's brand of it, so much that I eagerly await her new offering each year. I know that I have to set aside a full day to read it because I likely won't be able to put it down. And this year, today was that day. I am happy to report that this book did not disappoint.

Within the first few pages, I knew that this town and these characters were going to be special. Within the first pages, we are introduced to the mischievous young reader Katy (I would hazard a guess that many of us will see ourselves in her), our protagonist Juliet (the person who needs that special Heather Webber magic), and a whole town full of the sorts of people that help create the kind of found family that has become Webber's specialty. With a library at the center of the action, some romance at the outskirts, and a redemption arc that left me reaching for a tissue, I couldn't rate this anything less than five stars.

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