Greatest Hits: What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty

Join us the next five days and kick off the new year with The Book-A-Day Blog’s most popular posts of 2012!

 

“What if you could skip ahead ten years, and spend time with your future self?  Would you recognize who you’ve become?  This is the premise for Liane Moriarty’s novel What Alice Forgot.

 

One morning while in a step aerobics class, 39 year old Alice falls and hits her head.  When she wakes up, she believes it is 1998, and she is care-free, kind, in love with her husband, pregnant with their first child, and just beginning to restore their dream home.  The reality is that her 39 year old self doesn’t match up with that Alice – 2008 Alice has a beautiful home, three children, a marriage that’s crumbled, and a personality that is nothing like her former self.

 

As the story unfolds, Alice learns not only who she has become, but how and why she’s changed so dramatically.  She must figure out who Gina is, what has happened to her relationship with her sister, and why she and Nick have gone from happily married to fighting over everything, all the while trying to recapture her memories, and manage her busy life and children.

 

There’s also the story of Elisabeth, Alice’s sister, woven throughout the novel – told through letters to her therapist, as well as through letters that Frannie, Alice and Elisabeth’s grandmother, writes.  While seemingly two different stories at first, they cleverly help expand upon the novel’s exploration of the way in which time, and our experiences fundamentally change our personalities, subtly, until we’re forever altered by them.

 

What’s lovely about this book, which appears from the start to be a light-hearted read, is that it develops slowly in depth as one reads it.  It lends itself to reflection on the reader’s part, all the while continuing to be an engaging, fun read, with equal parts drama and comedy.  The epilogue is one of the most eloquent I have read – wrapping up the story in a few beautifully written pages.  I look forward to reading more by this Australian author.”

 

Find this book in our catalog.

Greatest Hits: Morgan’s Run by Colleen McCullough

Join us the next five days and kick off the new year with The Book-A-Day Blog’s most popular posts of 2012!

 

The settlement of Australia started because England could no longer ship their convicts to the colonies after the American Revolution.  With the prisons in England overflowing they needed to find another solution rather quickly. Fortunately, they had just laid claim to the Eastern half of the Australian continent. McCullough’s novel tells the story of Richard Morgan, who was a respectable business and family man in Bristol until he ran afoul of a smuggler with powerful connections.  He was framed for a crime and he was not allowed any defense at his trial.   He spent two years in prison in England before being put on the death ship to the new colony.  After surviving the difficult sea voyage, it was discovered that the ship had not carried enough food for the colony to survive a whole year.  The first days of the colony were extremely difficult. Many of the convicts, and also the soldiers guarding them, were in danger of starvation.

 

After a few months some of the prisoners, including Richard Morgan, were moved to Norfolk Island; a tiny speck of land out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.  These prisoners were sent with several free men and no soldiers and were simply left there with little supplies.  They had to build their own shelters and grow or catch their food.  Norfolk Island was a bit better for the settlers than the inhospitable Botany Bay, though. The soil was rich enough for planting and there was ample fishing off the coast. England wanted this island settled so they could produce hemp and would no longer have to buy it from Russia.  The experiment ultimately proved unsuccessful even though the settlers survived.

 

This fascinating story is based on a real person who was an ancestor of McCullough’s husband. The book mentioned at the end that McCullough would be writing a sequel to Morgan’s Run, but unfortunately this has not happened yet. Still, I highly recommend this book for fans of historical fiction, or anyone with an interest in Australia.

 

Find and reserve this book in our catalog.

What Alice Forgot by Liane Morarty

“What if you could skip ahead ten years, and spend time with your future self?  Would you recognize who you’ve become?  This is the premise for Liane Moriarty’s novel What Alice Forgot.

One morning while in a step aerobics class, 39 year old Alice falls and hits her head.  When she wakes up, she believes it is 1998, and she is care-free, kind, in love with her husband, pregnant with their first child, and just beginning to restore their dream home.  The reality is that her 39 year old self doesn’t match up with that Alice – 2008 Alice has a beautiful home, three children, a marriage that’s crumbled, and a personality that is nothing like her former self.

As the story unfolds, Alice learns not only who she has become, but how and why she’s changed so dramatically.  She must figure out who Gina is, what has happened to her relationship with her sister, and why she and Nick have gone from happily married to fighting over everything, all the while trying to recapture her memories, and manage her busy life and children.

There’s also the story of Elisabeth, Alice’s sister, woven throughout the novel – told through letters to her therapist, as well as through letters that Frannie, Alice and Elisabeth’s grandmother, writes.  While seemingly two different stories at first, they cleverly help expand upon the novel’s exploration of the way in which time, and our experiences fundamentally change our personalities, subtly, until we’re forever altered by them.

What’s lovely about this book, which appears from the start to be a light-hearted read, is that it develops slowly in depth as one reads it.  It lends itself to reflection on the reader’s part, all the while continuing to be an engaging, fun read, with equal parts drama and comedy.  The epilogue is one of the most eloquent I have read – wrapping up the story in a few beautifully written pages.  I look forward to reading more by this Australian author.”

Find and reserve this book in our catalog

Albert of Adelaide by Howard Anderson

Every once in a while, it’s nice to read something different, the type of book that one doesn’t usually read. Albert of Adelaide is decidedly different, and probably not like anything that most people usually read, because it is such an unusual novel. This debut novel is fun, full of adventure, and is about a platypus named Albert who escapes from the zoo in Adelaide and heads into the Australian outback looking for a place called “Old Australia.” Yup, that certainly sounds like a different kind of novel, but despite being different, it’s definitely still worthwhile.

That also happens to be one of the main lessons in this story – that just because someone is different, it doesn’t mean that they are bad. Albert’s journey brings him to an odd world with creatures who judge and mistrust him because he’s different from them. His early life was traumatic. His mother was attacked by a wild dingo when he was very young and Albert was captured and put in the Adelaide zoo. This is where he first hears rumors of a mythic and strange place called “Old Australia” where the many different species of animals live in peace and harmony. He was able to escape and hops a ride on the South Australian Railroad traveling north of Alice Springs to the outback.

Albert meets a wombat named Jack, who befriends him and teaches his some of the basics of survival in the desert. The two friends get into some trouble at a local pub and trading post when Albert gets very drunk and becomes very lucky at a game of chance. To escape Jack sets fire to the place and he and Albert are soon on the run with the kangaroo proprietor and other local animals posting wanted posters for Albert’s capture. Despite the fact that they’ve become good friends, Jack and Albert split up figuring it will be safer for each and Albert soon meets a new friend, TJ, a raccoon from California. Their friendship works well because they are both animals not native to the outback. Other creatures that Albert meets along his journey include two drunken bandicoots named Alvin and Roger, a mean and thieving pair consisting of a wallaby called Bertram and a possum named Theodore, assorted dingoes, and the Famous Muldoon, a Tasmanian devil. Muldoon and Jack were close friends and traveling companions once, but Jack’s pyromania led to their separation eight years ago.

Themes of friendship, revenge, survival, loss and self discovery are set against the backdrop of Albert’s journey across the outback desert. The story alternates between scenes of action (including many fight scenes and a huge shoot out at the end) and those of survival in the harsh environment and contemplation of life in a strange place among strange animals. In the end, Albert has come a very long way from where he started, both geographically and metaphysically.

Find and reserve this book in our catalog.

Morgan’s Run by Colleen McCullough

The settlement of Australia started because England could no longer ship their convicts to the colonies after the American Revolution.  With the prisons in England overflowing they needed to find another solution rather quickly. Fortunately, they had just laid claim to the Eastern half of the Australian continent. McCullough’s novel tells the story of Richard Morgan, who was a respectable business and family man in Bristol until he ran afoul of a smuggler with powerful connections.  He was framed for a crime and he was not allowed any defense at his trial.   He spent two years in prison in England before being put on the death ship to the new colony.  After surviving the difficult sea voyage, it was discovered that the ship had not carried enough food for the colony to survive a whole year.  The first days of the colony were extremely difficult. Many of the convicts, and also the soldiers guarding them, were in danger of starvation.

After a few months some of the prisoners, including Richard Morgan, were moved to Norfolk Island; a tiny speck of land out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.  These prisoners were sent with several free men and no soldiers and were simply left there with little supplies.  They had to build their own shelters and grow or catch their food.  Norfolk Island was a bit better for the settlers than the inhospitable Botany Bay, though. The soil was rich enough for planting and there was ample fishing off the coast. England wanted this island settled so they could produce hemp and would no longer have to buy it from Russia.  The experiment ultimately proved unsuccessful even though the settlers survived.

This fascinating story is based on a real person who was an ancestor of McCullough’s husband. The book mentioned at the end that McCullough would be writing a sequel to Morgan’s Run, but unfortunately this has not happened yet. Still, I highly recommend this book for fans of historical fiction, or anyone with an interest in Australia.

Find and reserve this book in our catalog.