Alice, Let’s Eat: Further Adventures of a Happy Eater by Calvin Trillin

Who and what is the book about (back-of-the-book blurb): In this delightful and delicious book, Calvin Trillin, guided by an insatiable appetite, embarks on a hilarious odyssey in search of “something decent to eat.” Across time zones and cultures, and often with his wife, Alice, at his side, Trillin shares his triumphs in the art of culinary discovery, including Dungeness crabs in California, barbecued mutton in Kentucky, potato latkes in London, blaff d’oursins in Martinique, and a $33 picnic on a no-frills flight to Miami.

His eating companions include Fats Goldberg, the New York pizza baron and reformed blimp; William Edgett Smith, the man with the Naughahyde palate; and his six-year-old daughter, Sarah, who refuses to enter a Chinese restaurant unless she is carrying a bagel (“just in case”). And though Alice “has a weird predilection for limiting our family to three meals a day,” on the road she proves to be a serious eater–despite “seemingly uncontrollable attacks of moderation.” 

Alice, Let Eat amply demonstrates why The New Republic called Calvin Trillin “a classic American humorist.”

Where and when does it take place: At the time Alice, Let’s Eat was first published (yes, this is a Vintage paperback first edition from September 1979), Calvin Trillin lived in Manhattan with his wife (Alice) and two young daughters. His eating adventures take us from New Orleans to California, down to the Caribbean, and across the pond to England.

Each chapter shares one of Trilllin’s eating adventures, and seem to be over a fairly compact period, perhaps a year in the mid- to late-70s.

What would I say to a friend who asked me about it: I’m glad I finally read some of the work of American humorist Calvin Trillin. I used to read Time magazine, who Trillin wrote for from 1996 – 2001, but I don’t remember his column from there. His style is very familiar, though, meaning both comfortable and reminiscent of something I’ve read before.

This book, centering on his enjoyment of food and his quest to find the epitome of each of the dishes he favors, will have foodies nodding their heads in recognition.

I loved how much the period in which Trillin wrote was reflected in his stories. He talked about phoning home each evening when he was away on a business trip. These were years well before the invention of the cell phone; in fact, Trillin didn’t even have a phone card (remember those cards, that let you charge a call to your home number after you pressed a series of 20 or so coded digits?). He writes of bringing a gourmet picnic on a plane; boldly carrying on food and beverage that would now be examined and perhaps confiscated by security.

Why did I read it: I paged through Quite Enough of Calvin Trillin: Forty Years of the Funny Stuff when we featured this compendium in the bookshop newsletter this fall. I hadn’t yet read any of his work, and understood that – although his humor is far-reaching – he is perhaps most well-known for his writings about food and Alice.

Trillin came up in conversation with a friend, who later lent me Alice, Let’s Eat and Too Soon to Tell. That’s a friend; thanks, Delia!

A few favorite passages: Trillin pokes fun of formulaic restaurants which use supposedly sophisticated terms to describe their offerings, saying they (p. 35):

have an array of Continental restaurants – Continental restaurants that are modeled, an unwary traveler can discover, on the continent of Antarctica, where everything starts out frozen.

I read the following passage aloud to J, as it is the way I often am able to justify the way I spend convoluted savings. J and I once sat in on a time share presentation in which the sales rep was trying to get us to understand that he was suggesting we invest our “anyway dollars” in the property. “Anyway dollars” refers to the money you’re going to spend on “something” in any case, so that “something” might as well be his time share (no, we didn’t buy). I believe Trillin’s Alice is on to something here (p. 54):

My decision to take a rather elegant picnic along on a no-frills flight to Miami was solidly based on a theory of economics known as Alice’s Law of Compensatory Cashflow, which holds that any money not spent on a luxury one considered even briefly is the equivalent of windfall income and should be spent accordingly. If you decide, for instance, that buying a five-hundred-dollar color television set would be, all things considered, and act of lunacy and the final step toward complete financial collapse, you have an extra five hundred dollars that you “saved” on the television set available to spend on something else.

And I enjoyed this from p. 93, in which Alice’s attempts to quietly restrain Calvin’s exuberant eating:

When we’re dressing to go to someone’s house for dinner, Alice often tries to persuade me that there are ways of showing appreciation to the hostess other than having thirds. I suppose there are ways of displaying appreciation for an artist’s painting other than writing out a check on the spot and snatching the painting from the wall, but is “My, how interesting” really what he wants to hear?

What else can I add: The love Calvin Trillin had for his wife and daughters shines through in this book as strongly as his love of a good filet mignon; Alice passed away in 2001.

The edition of the book I read (circa 1979) has a cover price of $1.95!

For more food-related posts, head over to Beth Fish Reads’ Weekend Cooking. There you’ll find all kinds of foodie themes – book reviews, recipes, cookbook sharing, food-themed movie reviews, etc.

Defending Jacob by William Landay

Who and what is the book about (back-of-the-book blurb): Andy Barber, assistant DA, is respected in his community, tenacious in the courtroom, and happy at home with his wife, Laurie, and son, Jacob. But when a shocking crime shatters their New England town, Andy is blindsided by what happens next: His fourteen-year-old son is charged with the murder of a fellow student.

Every parental instinct Andy has rallies to protect his boy, but he faces a trial of his own — between loyalty and justice, between truth and allegation, between a past he’s tried to bury and a future he cannot conceive.

This is the consummate novel of an embattled family in crisis — a suspenseful, character-driven mystery that is also a spellbinding tale of guilt, betrayal, and the terrifying speed at which our lives can spin out of control.

Where and when does it take place: Andy Barber and his family live in Newton, Massachusetts, an affluent suburb of Boston.  The murder of an eighth-grader – and much of the plot – occurs in this town; courtroom scenes are set in the Middlesex County Courthouse in Cambridge. Defending Jacob takes place over about a year, from the day of the murder in April 2007 to a Grand Jury scene in April 2008 (foreshadowed in Chapter 1).

What would I say to a friend who asked me about it: Now, you know I don’t read a lot of murder mysteries, but this isn’t your typical who-done-it. Landay strikes deep into the heart of parents (in this case, the victim and the accused are 8th grade boys; I’m the mother of an 8th grade boy!) by asking how far we’ll go to protect/defend our children. He also examines the struggle of nature vs. nurture, which is another topic near and dear to my heart (having taken 100% credit for the gentle quiet manner our older son, explaining that ‘mommy and me’ activities and near-constant classical music helped mold his sweet personality, only to be bested by his younger brother – also very sweet – but the epitome of “rough and tumble” despite being raised in the same environment).

The novel is told in the first person, in Andy Barber’s voice. Because there is this parental perspective of the narrator, there is also a bias. Andy is shocked as the town closes ranks against the accused, and friends, neighbors, and colleagues keep their distance. He and Laurie attempt to maintain some sense of normalcy – instituting sit-down family dinners and banning new reports from their television viewing.

There is a psychological mystery here, in addition to the murder mystery. These questions of parenting styles, nature vs. nurture, community response, and the mob mentality make Defending Jacob a good choice for a book group that is willing to push into some perhaps uncomfortable territory (personal can be uncomfortable, after all. But that discomfort/stretch can help us grow).

Oh, and of course I love the Newton setting – reading a novel which incorporates familiar place and local landmarks is always fun. The Newton demographic is very similar to the town where we live, and I found myself nodding along as Landay introduced personality types that struck close to home.

Why did I read it: At the NEIBA fall conference I asked our Random House rep “if I could read only one book of the next season, what would it be?” He placed Defending Jacob in my hands. Again, murder mysteries are not my standard fare, but that strong recommendation (coupled with a familiar setting), made for a winning pitch. To be fair, the rep told me I had to read more than one, and stacked three other books on my pile … I’m reading as fast as I can!

A few favorite passages: This goes to the heart of the community’s response, and it could be any town in America (p. 11):

What made the Rifkin murder so profane was that it involved one of the town’s children. It was a violation of Newton’s self-image. For a while a sign had stood in Newton Centre declaring the place “A Community of Families, a Family of Communities,” and you often heard it repeated that Newton was “a good place to raise kids.” Which indeed it was. It brimmed with test-prep centers and after-school tutors, karate dojos and Saturday soccer leagues. The town’s young parents especially prized this idea of Newton as a child’s paradise. Many of them had left the hip, sophisticated city to move here. They had accepted masses expenses, stultifying monotony, and the queasy disappointment of settling for a conventional life. To these ambivalent residents, the whole suburban project made sense only because it was “a good place to raise kids.” They had staked everything on it.

I liked this bit of insight, although I’d argue that I fall into the role of “youngest child” whenever our adult family gathers (p. 71):

At some point as adults we cease to be our parents’ children and we become our children’s parents instead.

And this, as Andy observes the changes the stress has wrought on Laurie (p. 147):

Once, my wife read so constantly that she would hold a book in her left hand while she brushed her teeth with the right; now she never picked up a book, she could not muster the concentrations or even the interest.

What else can I add: William Landay is the author of The Strangler and Mission Flats. He’s a former district attorney, living outside Boston. Defending Jacob made the IndieNext list for February 2012, as recommended by independent booksellers nationwide.

A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty by Joshilyn Jackson

Who and what is the book about (back-of-the-book blurb): A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty is a powerful saga of three generations of women, plagued by hardships and torn by a devastating secret, yet inextricably joined by the bonds of family. Fifteen-year-old Mosey Slocumb – spirited, sassy, and on the cusp of womanhood – is shaken when a small grave is unearthed in the backyard, and determined to figure out why it’s there. Liza, her stroke-ravaged mother, is haunted by choices she made as a teenager. But it is Ginny – known as “Big” -, Mosey’s strong and big-hearted grandmother, whose maternal love braids together the strands of the women’s shared past — and who will stop at nothing to defend their future.

Where and when does it take place: Mississippi, in the current day; Jackson shares some backstory of when Big was 15 (and pregnant with Liza), and a lot of flashback to when Liza was 15 (and pregnant with Mosey), but most of the novel focuses on the present day and what’s happening with Mosey and her interactions with Liza and Big – whose initial concern is to make sure Mosey break the “15 and pregnant” pattern. When a shallow grave, bones, and a tattered baby blanket are unearthed in the backyard, their focus changes quickly.

What would I say to a friend who asked me about it: Once again Joshilyn Jackson has shattered the myths I once held about “Southern fiction.” Her novels are multi-layered, and look at realistic relationships and challenges. These are strong women, not hesitant to speak up for what’s right, and to do anything to protect those that they love. Jackson takes on social/economic class and its perceived relation to “class” (as in Jackie O class), showing that one can have riches in the bank, but be poor in spirit – and vice versa.

The three generations of Slocumb women (Ginny/”Big”, Liza, and Mosey) found strengths they (or others) didn’t know they had. Mosey didn’t rely solely on her mother and grandmother, though; her best friend is Roger, the proverbial ‘boy next door,’ and she develops a friendship with Patti, a female classmate from the “wrong side of the tracks” as the book progresses.

The format of the narrative helped me to get caught up in the world of Big, Liza, and Mosey. Some chapters are told in first-person from Big or Mosey’s view; others are told in third-person, with a focus on Liza. This is especially effective as Liza struggles to communicate post-stroke.

Why did I read it: The first novel by Joshilyn Jackson that read (listened to) was Backseats Saints, which took me by surprise in the most positive of ways. I commented on the “depth and intricacy of the plot,” and noted that I “loved the characters” (hee-hee, I sound like a Zagat Guide!). Since that time (August 2010 – oh, how fondly I remember when I had the time to read through a new-to-me author’s backlist), I’ve had her on my “must read more!” list. This “to do” list, coupled with the opportunity to hear Joshilyn Jackson as the keynote speaker at the Salem List Fest this past fall (she’s smart, she’s funny, and, of course, and excellent storyteller), pushed me to gobble up this latest novel when I had the chance. Plus, I have a 15-year daughter, and was eager to peek into the mind of this species via an author who tells it like it is.

A few favorite passages: The opening paragraphs pull the reader in (this is from the Prologue, told in Big’s voice):

My daughter, Liza, put her heart in a silver box and buried it under the willow tree in our backyard. Or as close to under that tree as she could anyway. The thick web of roots shunted her off to the side, to the place where the willow’s long fingers trailed down. They swept back and forth across the troubled earth, helping Liza smooth away the dig marks.

It was foolish. there’s no way to hide things underground in Mississippi. Our rich, wet soil turns every winter burial into a spring planting. Over the years, Liza’s heart, small and cold and broken as it was, grew into a host of secrets that could ruin us all and cost us Mosey, Liza’s own little girl. I can’t blame Liza, though. She was young and hurt, and she did the best she could.

And after all, I’m the damn fool who went and dug it up.

What else can I add: I read the print edition of A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty, but feel confident recommending the audio edition as well. I so enjoyed Jackson’s narration of Backseat Saints – she’s the rare author whose spoken voice is perfect for her written voice. Oh, and when I was at the Salem Lit Fest I purchased gods in Alabama (which several people have pointed to as her *best* novel); it’ll be the next Joshilyn Jackson I read.

One more thing … trivia: her first name is pronounced like “Jocelyn” (no “shhh” sound).

So Sweet!: Cookies, Cupcakes, Whoopie Pies, and More by Sur La Table

Back-of-the-book blurb: Proving that life is indeed oh So Sweet! cooking authority Sur La Table offers 50 fabulously sweet baking recipes with intriguing flavor combinations. From cookies and cupcakes to doughnuts and whoopie pies, you’ll find them all in this attractive and giftable full-color package. And just in case you’re uncertain what your sweet tooth is craving, a handy flavor profile reveals whether you’re in the mood for sweet, salty, chocolatey, fruity, or nutty. Remind yourself of the sweeter side of life with So Sweet!

She Is Too Fond of Books’ thoughts: The cover drew me in – a presentation of single serving sweets that look like they come from a bakery, but that I can make at home?! Then the subtitle … aside from fond memories of my Gram’s hermit cookies, one of my favorite baked treats were her whoopie pies. I’m in, So Sweet!

This is a compact sized hardcover cookbook (about 6 inches square), that will be a thoughtful gift for a sweetie on your Valentine’s Day list (and, yes, if you enjoy baking and sweets, that includes a gift to yourself!).

The book focuses on the recipes themselves, rather than filling the pages with extensive baking tips, pantry lists, etc., Sur La Table concentrates on clear and complete instructions and beautiful photographs.

While my favorites are the single-serve items (in my opinion, serving is simpler, and presentation is prettier), there are a number of bar/pan cookies and crumbles that I wouldn’t say “no” to!

And those doughnuts? They’re baked! Yes, skip the deep frying and feel less guilty about having a donut. The donut recipe that most calls to me? Maple and bacon. The recipe makes 16 large or 64 mini doughnuts; I’ll make the minis, to feel even less guilt

It’s cold here today, and we’re coming into a 3-day weekend with the kids home from school. Sounds like the perfect time to bake; we’ll choose from:

• Cherry Oatmeal Cookies
• Chocolate Mint Brownies with White Chocolate Chunks
• Rocky Road Cupcakes
• Kahlúa and Cream Whoopie Pies
• Lemon Poppy Seed Doughnuts
• Blueberry Buttermilk Doughnuts (recipe below)

This is my first cookbook from Sur La Table, and, based on the quality of recipes, photos, and overall package, it will be the first of many. Other titles from the group include Simple Comforts (perfect for winter weather!), Gifts Cooks Love: Recipes for Giving, and Baking Kids Love.

Visit more Weekend Cooking posts Beth Fish Reads’ Weekend Cooking. There you’ll find a round-up of fantastic food-themed posts from around the web – cookbook reviews, recipes, photographs, tips and tricks for the busy kitchen, etc. As Beth Fish says, “if it’s remotely foodie, it qualifies!”

Breadcrumbs by Anne Ursu

Who and what is the book about (back-of-the-book blurb): A stunning modern-day fairy tale – Once upon a time, Hazel and Jack were best friends. But that was before he stopped talking to her and disappeared into a forest with a mysterious woman made of ice. Now it’s up to Hazel to go in after him. Inspired by Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Snow Queen,” Breadcrumbs is a story of the struggle to hold on, and the things we leave behind.

Where and when does it take place: Breadcrumbs is neatly divided into two sections – the first takes place in a midwestern suburb in the present day; the second section is set “in the woods,” an enchanted and timeless forest ruled by a woman made of ice.

What would I say to a friend who asked me about it: Breadcrumbs is a wonderful middle grade novel which – while giving nods to several fairy tales and fantasy books – is unique in its exploration of changes in the lives of the young protagonists. Hazel and Jack have been best friends for ages; now in their upper elementary years, Jack seems ready to let go of their shared fantasies and spend more time with his male peers. Hazel, always more creative and individual than her classmates, has found shelter and support in Jack’s friendship, and has little interest in spending time doing (stereotypical) activities with other girls. Aside from the changing rhythms of their childhoods, Hazel and Jack have both experienced more abrupt changes in the past few years – Hazel’s parents have divorced, and her Dad is remarrying; Jack’s mother suffers from depression (referred to as a ‘sadness’ in the novel).

When Jack disappears into the mysterious woods, Hazel knows he’s in trouble, and that only she can save him. Once she crosses beyond the tree line, the real magic kicks in. Just like in the outside world, things are not always as they appear; Hazel has to assess people’s motivations, learn who she can trust, and ultimately rely on her own strength and the power of friendship. Because we are always with Hazel, and never alone with Jack, we see more of her growth as a character. She is a strong female protagonist, and a positive, encouraging model for young readers.

Why did I read it: Breadcrumbs got a lot of pre-publication attention, which brought it to my attention. While I don’t often review middle grade (or young adult) books because I feel I’m not the target audience, and can’t give the “best” (most accurate, most insightful) review, I decided to take the plunge with this novel.

A few favorite passages: I marked several passages, enjoying the subtle references to The Chronicles of Narnia, A Wrinkle in Time, and the Harry Potter series, among others, while noting “hey, I should re-read (or, in some cases, read for the first time) that book!”

This is the opening paragraph of the novel, which so neatly sets the stage for what is to come:

It snowed right before Jack stopped talking to Hazel, fluffy white flakes big enough to show their crystal architecture, like perfect geometric poems. It was the sort of snow that transforms the world around it into a different kind of place. You know what it’s like – when you wake up to find everything white and soft and quiet, when you run outside and your breath suddenly appears before you in a smoky poof, when you wonder for a moment if the world in which you woke up is not the same one that you went to bed in the night before. Things like that happen, at least in the stories you read. It was the sort of snowfall that, if there were any magic to be had in the world, would make it come out.

And this sage observation from an adult in the suburbs (before Hazel followed Jack into the woods):

“I believe that the world isn’t always what we can see. … And I believe that goodness wins out. … if someone’s changed overnight … you have to show them what’s good. You show them love. That works a surprising amount of the time. And if that doesn’t save them, they’re not worth saving.”

What else can I add: Breadcrumbs was selected as NPR’s Backseat Book Club pick for December 2011; middle grade listeners were invited to read the book (along with their parents), to discuss it among the family, ask questions and submit observations to NPR, and to send in photos of themselves reading. This is a fantastic program, and a great way to engage families (and classrooms) in conversations about books … and whatever else it may lead to.

Anne Ursu is also the author of the Cronus Chronicles (The Shadow Thieves, The Siren Song, and The Immortal Fire), and teaches in an MFA program in Writing for Children. You can find her on Facebook and on Twitter. Breadcrumbs was named a finalist in the 2011 Cybils (Children’s and Young Adults Blogger’s Literary Awards).

Running the Rift by Naomi Benaron

Who and what is the book about (back-of-the-book blurb: Running the Rift follows Jean Patrick Nkuba, a gifted Rwandan boy, from the day he knows that running will be his life to the moment he must run to save his life, a ten-year span in which his country is undone by the Hutu-Tutsi tensions. Born a Tutsi, he is thrust into a world where it’s impossible to stay apolitical; yet in an environment increasingly restrictive for the Tutsi, he holds fast to his dream of becoming Rwanda’s first Olympic medal contender in track, a feat he believes might deliver him and his people from this violence.

Where and when does it take place: We meet Jean Patrick in 1984, a young Tutsi boy living with his family in Gihundwe. Even then there are tensions between the Hutu, and the Tutsi people  - at school Jean Patrick is asked to stand and be counted in a census of Tutsi students; prior to this he had been sheltered from the “us” and “them” attitude. Tensions increase, violence is threatened, and the family moves to live with an uncle in a more rural area. The majority of the novel covers the period 1990 – 1994.

What would I say to a friend who asked me about it: This is a highly-recommended book which takes place in the decade leading up to the Rwandan genocide. It follows a talented young Tutsi boy who has dreams of becoming an Olympic athlete. When ethnic tensions increase, he’s on the minority side, and has to make decisions that affect him and his own future, as well as that of his family and friends. It’s a difficult book at times – the author writes so that we get to know (and care about) the characters, and she doesn’t gloss over the violence; she eases us into seeing and confronting something very uncomfortable. That same difficulty (discomfort) is one reason I will push it into your hands.

Why did I read it: Back in May 2010, Running the Rift was one of the books at the Editor’s Buzz panel at BEA – a book that the publisher was “handselling” to all the booksellers in attendance. Algonquin Books tend to be very a good fit for my reading personality, and this was perfect.

A few favorite passages: Jean Patrick must make choices that affect his future; he feels guilty about following his life-long heart’s desire and potentially turning his back on his ethnicity (p 111):

… in a flash of insight, he realized that he needn’t feel shame for his choices. [His friends] chose to fight with bullets. He had chosen to fight with his legs. As Uncle told him, each time he won, he carried all Tutsi with him. And maybe it wasn’t a matter of choice. Maybe, since birth, Ukubo kw’Imana, the Arm of God, had set them spinning one way or the other.

One of the people who befriends Jean Patrick is an American geology professor named Jonathan. Benaron inserts a few clever geologic metaphors as Jean Patrick compares the physical landscape to the political landscape (p 176):

In the purplish light, Jean Patrick could just make out the stripes of pale and dark rocks, the abruptly discordant layers. In class, Jonathan had spoken of tectonic upheaval. Rwanda, he said, was a landscape twisted and folded, tied in knots by a history of pressure and heat. Its insides heaved and shifted, disgorging their molten contents.

What else can I add: Running the Rift won the 2010 Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction. Author Barbara Kingsolver established the Prize, which “was created to promote fiction that addresses issues of social justice and the impact of culture and politics on human relationships.” The biennial award has recently been re-named the PEN/Bellwether Prize; previous winners include Donna Gershten (Kissing the Virgin’s Mouth, 2000), Gayle Brandeis (The Book of Dead Birds, 2002), Marjorie Kowalski Cole (Correcting the Landscape, 2004), Hillary Jordan (Mudbound, 2006), and Heidi W. Durrow (The Girl Who Fell From the Sky, 2008).

A sure sign of a novel that clicked with me is that it gets me interested in reading more about the subject (reading both more fiction set in the same time/place, and reading non-fiction about historical events that are central to the novel). Baking Cakes in Kigali (Gaile Parkin) has been suggested as a novel for me to read; do you have any suggestions for non-fiction?

Learning Joy from Dogs without Collars by Lauralee Summer

For a month we lived in a shelter in a large institutional building. The inside was made up of cinder-block cubicles. They were coded by color and number; each had two sets of bunk beds with bare mattresses. My mom and I lived for a month in Yellow Number 3. I remember one day … being sick … Two children at the shelter gave me a get-well note. On the outside of the card a childish script scrawls: To Yellow Number 3.

(p. 75)

We didn’t have a checkerboard, but Ibrahim thought we might be able to make one. That evening he stopped by the family room [in the shelter] with a square of cardboard and a permanent marker. With the marker, he made a grid on the cardboard, coloring every other square in black. I found an old puzzle in the lounge. Many of its pieces were missing, but I picked out pieces of gray clouds and blue sky to use as checkers. We each sat on a plastic milk crate in the hallway and put the checkerboard on another between us. He was blue and I gray, fragmented pieces of sky and cloud.

(p. 127)

Children need to trust in their parents’ ability to provide for them, but many poor children cannot. They see their parents’ weakness, see them as slaves to the welfare dole. I knew that the welfare system was strong and powerful, and not my mother. This knowledge produced an inner conflict, a trauma, a yearning, a shame and anger and fear that battled with my desire to love and trust in my mother … I was afraid of being tainted by my mother’s shame and weakness.

(p.94)

We had a small refrigerator in our room. Many of the welfare motels didn’t. In another hotel, a woman we knew kept her two-year-old daughter’s milk cold by putting it outside the window ledge. She had to stop when the motel management said it was against the rules. “It’s so hard – we eat junk food all the time because we can’t cook or keep anything cool,” she complained. Food stamps can’t buy restaurant meals either, so people in the welfare hotels often have no way to eat regular, balanced meals.

(p. 131)

If Jack’s in Love by Stephen Wetta

Back-of-the-book blurb:  It’s 1967. Jack Witcher is a twelve-year-old boy genius living in a Virginia suburb at an address the entire neighborhood avoids. Jack’s father has lost his job-again-and he’s starting fights with other fathers. Jack’s mother, sweet but painfully ugly, works as a cashier at a local market. Jack’s older brother is a long-haired, pot-smoking hippie.

If all of that isn’t bad enough, Jack’s brother suddenly becomes the main suspect in the disappearance of the town’s golden boy. And to make matters even worse, Jack is in love with the missing boy’s sister, Myra. Mr. Gladstein, the town jeweler and solitary Jew, is Jack’s only friend; together, they scheme to win Jack Myra’s love. But to do that, Jack must overcome the prejudices, both the town’s and his own, about himself and his family.

She Is Too Fond of Books’ review: Stephen Wetta must have had fun choosing the surnames for the characters in this debut novel, set in 1967 in the fictional El Dorado Hills, Virginia. We meet Witchers, Joyners, Puddings, Taylors, and one Gladstein; all have name that somehow conjure up an accurate image of a personality. Even Snead, the only black man in town, had a somewhat “snide” or “sneering” attitude toward the main character’s family. Or maybe I’m reading too much into it … it was fun to ponder, anyway.

The protagonist, Jack Witcher, is a 13-year-old from a family with a “white trash” reputation – Dad is perpetually unemployed and often drunk, Mom is ugly as sin (but kind hearted), brother Stan is an 18-year-old derelict – he doesn’t hold a job, and plans to enroll at a local college to avoid the Vietnam draft. Screens in the Witcher house are missing or broken, junk is piled up in the side yard, and the reader can imagine a broken-down car up on cinder blocks in the driveway.

Jack is an excellent student, which gives him some sense of satisfaction and accomplishment beyond the grunts he earns from his father and the taunts and pointed slights he receives from most of the other neighborhood children. His one friend, Dickie Pudding, abandons Jack soon after Stan is investigated as the lead suspect in the disappearance of Gaylord Joyner, the older son of one of El Dorado Hill’s most upstanding families.

This disappearance happens just as Jack is developing a fledging relationship with Myra Joyner, Gaylord’s younger sister. No one can know of the relationship; this is a re-telling of the long-standing feuds between Hatfields and McCoys, Montagues and Capulets, or Jets and Sharks. Myra trusts one of the neighborhood girls to act as go-between, and Jack gets romantic advice from a most unlikely adult source.

The crux of the novel is both Jack’s struggle to differentiate himself from the family into which he was born, and the experience of his first crush. Hmm, that would be cruces of the novel, not crux, I can’t choose just one. As I read, I kept thinking of the adage “you can choose your friends, but you can’t choose your family.” Poor Jack.

It was a pleasure to read the narration as Jack shared his first crush – the rapid heartbeat, the rehearsing what he would say to Myra, reading and re-reading a note she sent him, replaying in his mind their every conversation, and his anticipation (and anxiety) about a first kiss. This levity was in sharp contrast to the anger and fear he felt as the investigation into Gaylord’s disappearance heated up, and relationships between the various Witcher family members started to fragment.

I love the setting of El Dorado Hills, Virginia; it struck me as an absolutely realistic portrayal of not only the physical traits of a neighborhood in those years, but also of the way children spent their days, and the way in which neighbors were more connected (for good or for bad). In the very first chapter, Jack expresses “I think I belonged to the last generation of kids that could play outside.” While this isn’t strictly so, I know that my days of outdoor play in the late 70s were much different that what my children experience now.

In “A Note from the Author” at the back of the book, Stephen Wetta introduces the reader to the family that was on his mind when he wrote If Jack’s in Love, a family which shared many characteristics with the Witchers. Wetta says:

The Smiths of the world serve a cautionary purpose. There’s something sacrificial about them. They perform a social function. They set a bottom, a defining limit, to what we dread and fear about ourselves, and reassure us that we haven’t reached it yet.

The more I think about If Jack’s in Love, the more discussion points I come up with; a darn good thing, since I’m leading our online book group discussion of the novel in January!

To read more about If Jack’s in Love, head over to Beth Fish Reads, where she featured the novel in an Imprint Friday post.