The Lace Reader: A Novel
by Brunonia Barry
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Book Reviews of The Lace Reader: A Novel
Book Review: The Lace Reader
Summary: 5 Stars
Beautiful and as exquisite as Battenburg lace, The Lace Reader is an intricate story set in Salem, Mass. (Yes, that Salem.) Home to witches and weirdoes, Salem is also the residence of the Whitneys, a family that has lived there for generations. The Whitney women keep the secret of reading lace and other psychic abilities, with the matriarch Eva teaching all who wish to see the future how to read lace in her tea shop. But Eva's gone missing, so the family summons home wayward daughter Towner Whitney, the protagonist and teller of this tale.
Towner is an unreliable narrator. She admits in the very first paragraph that she lies, and follows this revelation with the admission that she is also crazy. Years ago her memories were shock-treated away after the traumatic suicide of her twin sister, and she's been trying to reconstruct her past ever since. As she returns to Salem and encounters people she used to know and meets new residents, the tangled threads of her past begin to come together and take shape, twisting into designs and realities she never anticipated.
This is a mystery. Where is Eva, and later, where is Ann? What happened all those years ago before Whitney left Salem?
This is a romance, albeit a sedated one. Will Towner allow herself to fall for the awkward-but-kind op that moved to Salem after his marriage fell apart? Or will she allow an old flame into her heart once more?
This is a drama. The Calvinists, an extremely conservative religious cult lead by the Rev. Cal (also related to Towner), are in constant warfare with the modern witches who have taken Salem and made it their own. Will charismatic Cal rally his troops and gain enough support to bring Salem in line with his church's dogma? Can Towner resolve her issues with her estranged mother, distant brother, lost aunt and dead sister?
Amazingly, author Brunonia Barry never loses track of her many threads and weaves a rich story, multi-faceted and complex. Heck, somehow she manages to pull it all together without the end feeling contrived. There are surprises and unexpected delights throughout. Truly, this is the best book I've read (so far) in 2008!
Book Review: A fascinating story!
Summary: 4 Stars
THE LACE READER (Novel/Susp-Towner Whitney-Mass-Cont) - VG
Barry, Brunonia - 1st book
Wm. Morrow, 2008, ARC - ISBN: 9780061688584
First Sentence: My name is Towner Whitney.
Towner Whitney grew up in Salem, Massachusetts, a town known for the witch trials in the 1600s and where, in the present, witches have become a major economic asset; except to Cal and his group of "Calvinist" religious fanatics. Tower descends from a family of women who read the future using lace as the medium.
Having lived in California for the past 10-years and recovering from surgery, she returns to Salem after being notified that her Aunt Eva, who principally raised her, is missing. Coming back to Salem is memories and relationships, including Cal, whom she believes is responsible for Eva's disappearance.
The story begins with our being told that everything Towner tells us is a lie and everything told by the narrator is true. It is important to keep that distinction in mind. But rather than it being a lie, it's about memory and a distorted perception of what is true. This changes as the story unfolds.
There is a theme of circles throughout the story; the circle of women whether they be the lace makers, the witches or the Red Hat Ladies, and the circle of past and present. For Towner, it's her life, memories and the relationships with those around her.
Towner is a fascinating protagonist and certainly unusual. She is a seer and a lace reader, but you never quite know where things stand with her. When young, she and her sister broke into a house and cleaned it. "The kind of thing only a girl would do."
It's not the easiest book to follow But it is a compelling story with a wonderful sense of place, wry humor, a paranormal element that I very much enjoyed, and some very good suspense that kept me turning the pages wanting to know how it would end.
It's not a perfect book. There were some threads begun and left hanging. But I was reading the ARC and can hope those were corrected in the final version. I may just be curious enough to buy the final to find out.
Book Review: Wait For The Paperback Edition
Summary: 3 Stars
The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry
This will be a very short review. Something that I haven't done in a while.
If any of you are old enough to remember the TV show Dallas and the "The Dream" then you will understand what I say that The Lace Reader ended virtually the same way. Oh, not with a dream, oh no; that would have been something I might of roused myself out of my stupor for. No, this 385 page book book ended with a lie.
Sophya "Towner" Whitney is the narrator and main character of this book set in the historic town of Salem, Massachusetts. Towner is, and has been for a while - delusional, psychotic, crazy, nutsy cuckoo - take your pick.
She returns to Salem because of the disappearance of her Great-Aunt Eva. Ultimately it will be the death of her Great-Aunt that keeps Towner there among a few other things.
This story is confusing, frustrating, filled with so many characters that at least half of them could have been cut to make way for a tighter storyline. Many of the characters are written to the point of being caricatures, over-blown with stereotyping. The men are painted as weak and each one with tremendous flaws, the women are strong, strong, strong to the point of disbelief. Is this a mystery novel, a journal of Towners quest for sanity, a paranormal romance? A Chick/Lit 'women rule men drool' book? Who knows and more to the point, by the end of the book you may not care.
On the up side, I'll bet this book did wonders for Salem's tourist trade, as many of the places and events Barry talks about are real and true (I've been to Salem several times and remember a lot of what she mentions).
This book was bought for more than 2.4 million dollars by William Morrow - I wonder what they saw in it that I didn't? I admit that this book is getting very good reviews from the "Powers That Be" and from quite a few of the readers too. Perhaps if you had intended to read this book you will do well to see what favorable reviews it's getting, for I seem to be in a distinct minority with my opinions.
Book Review: Spellbinding
Summary: 5 Stars
When I saw the first reviews of this novel, I knew I was going to want to read it. It takes place in Salem, MA, just a little to the north of where I live. The author has created the concept of reading lace as a way of divining the future. Very intriguing; a touch of magic in a very real place.
Yesterday I started to read it - and I read the whole thing in one day. The mixture of the very real Salem with the one that exists in Towner Whitney's world drew me in. I love to go up to Salem for the Haunted Happenings around Halloween, and a lot of the color the author shares with us - the witches, both real and historical, the whole feeling of "Universal Tours without the budget" - is authentic. Within moments of returning, Towner is greeted by a a man wearing a Frankenstein head, handing out flyers. Yep, it's really like that.
Towner Whitney has just returned to Salem after a long absence, brought back by the disappearance of her great-aunt Eva, the "lace reader" of the title. Towner can read lace, too, but she finds it too frightening and refuses to use her gift. She had never intended to return; she has too many dark memories of her life in Salem. She is especially troubled by the memory of the suicide of her twin sister, Lyndley, at the age of 17.
Her mother, May, is agoraphobic and won't leave Yellow Dog Island, where she takes in women escaping from abusive relationships. May's half-sister Emma was blinded and brain-damaged by a beating from her husband, Cal, a scary man who is now leading a group of fundamentalists calling themselves Calvinists. We meet other people in Salem, including one of the witches, Ann Chase, and the romantic interest, a policeman named Rafferty.
I found the whole story absorbing and believable. The people came to life for me, perhaps because I know the place where they live. The ending has a twist which has been compared to the Sixth Sense, and it took me completely by surprise. Now I want to sit down and read the novel again.
Book Review: I didn't want it to end.
Summary: 5 Stars
Beginning this story is like leaning back into a soft feather bed on a winters night. I am breathless with anticipation as each page ends and I turn to the next. I want more, and I want it now. But also, I dread coming to the end.
I feel the breeze blowing my hair back from my face, and smell that northern sea. There is nothing like it. I watch the bricks of Salem passing under my feet. I am there.
Towner, is the main character. Her story is no less compelling or real than those of the others in the book. Eva, May, even Ann one of the more renowned witches in town all have their own equally strong personalities and stories. Mostly, it is about the Whitney family, life in a small town, and the injuries we all suffer as we make our way through life. It is the story of life through the eyes of Sophya, who takes the the name Towner in a desperate attempt to distance herself from things she cannot bear to remember.
May lives on Yellow Dog Island, and her home is a sanctuary for abused women. Emma, her half sister lives there as well. They work the land for food, and they make lace. The Whitney family woman all read lace. It is a family gift, or curse depending on how each woman sees the lace.
Towner is living in California until a call from her brother draws her to her home in Salem. A home only minutes away by boat from Yellow Dog Island. Once she is again face to face with her childhood home, she has to deal with family mysteries both current and in the past. Facing these mysteries, learning to accept the abilities she had to read people, and to see them after they have passed on is a fascinating and intriguing read. No less intriguing is the story of Towner's healing.
Like the most beautiful examples of lace itself, this story is woven, interwoven and no thread is left hanging free. It pulls them all together to create a work of art to be cherished. A piece to look at again and again merely because it exists.