Monday, October 04, 2010

Fiction Review: A Soft Place to Land

I had never heard of this author, Susan Rebecca White, before but picked up A Soft Place to Land on the Buy 1, get 1 Free table at Borders this summer because it sounded interesting.  I ended up enjoying it very much.

It's the story of two sisters and their relationship from childhood to adulthood.  When I started it, I worried it would be one of those idealized portraits of sisters, but I was pleasantly surprised that it was a well-rounded, realistic view of both the closeness of sisters and the conflicts that can tear them apart.

The novel begins with the two girls' parents being killed in a plane crash.  The sisters, who are four years' apart, deal with this disaster in very different ways.  Over the years, various circumstances and conflicts pull them apart.  Although they love each other, they often don't understand each other.  I thought the characters, dialogue, and situations were very real and sometimes reminded me of the complex relationship I have with my own sister.  Overall, it was an engrossing and enjoyable book.

352 pages, Touchstone Books

2 comments:

  1. Sounds like a good book, Sue. I'll have to look for it!

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  2. Thought I'd post my replies here rather than you blog of a year a go. in response to the question did I find making a list of my top ten authors hard. Yes. Many authors I enjoy a lot but I've read very few of their books so I tried to select authors that I have at least read several of their books. Because I am a high school librarian, I read mostly YA lit that is why half of my list were YA authors.

    I went to your list of favorite books (2009) and decided that I pick favorite books on rereadability. Have I or would I be willing to reread the book? So here's a list of my top ten that I quickly have compiled without much thought:
    Pride and Prejudice (Austen)
    Persuasion (Austen)
    To Kill a Mockingbird (Lee)
    A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Smith)
    Chronicles of Narnia (Lewis)
    The Book Thief (Zusak)
    Peace Like a River (Enger)
    Shipping News (Proulx)
    The Secret Life of Bees (Kidd)
    Poisonwood Bible (Kingsolver)

    Thanks for the feedback on the new look on my blog. It takes me forever to do technological things so it was a big step to spruce it up and make the picture, etc.

    -Anne

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