Shades of Light - Sharon Garlough Brown

Wren is a young woman struggling with mental health issues exacerbated by her work as a social worker.  When her depression and anxiety escalates to the point where she is hospitalised, she struggles to find a way forward, and finds chinks of light in art.  

When she is discharged, she can no longer pick up where she left off and has to make major changes to her life, but with the help of her friend Kit (whose own story comes to light more in Remember Me) she begins to make good progress. But then a troubled figure from her past reappears.

 

This is another book with strong writing and a story which draws you in.  Wren’s struggles are graphically described without overpowering the story.  I loved the way her family is portrayed too, with the effects of Wren’s mental health issues on them well outlined, especially in the case of her mother.  

 

The mentions of the Van Gogh paintings throughout are clever and make for extra interest, and there are some lovely artistic descriptions and symbolism.  This is not a light read, but it is one which picks up on some very difficult issues and explores them well, and I would particularly recommend it to anyone who knows or loves someone struggling with serious mental illness.

Courting Mr Emerson - Melody Carlson

Melody Carlson has written a staggering 200 books, with sales of over seven million copies. Well known for her Christmas novellas and youth fiction, this is a gentle contemporary grown-up read.  The Mr Emerson of the title is George Emerson, mid-fifties and about to retire from his teaching job.  He lives a reserved life rather like someone about twenty years older than he actually is.  He spends a lot of time trying to avoid his over-interested neighbour Lorna, but his life suddenly becomes very complicated when he meets the free spirited artist Willow, the grandmother of one of his students, Collin.

This is a delightful story.  George and Willow’s growing friendship is very entertainingly written, as are the details of what happens when Willow’s estranged daughter Josie arrives back on the scene, much to the disgust of Collin, the son she abandoned as a toddler. There’s plenty of character interaction, and the story is energetic and engaging reading.  Just complicated enough to keep you concentrating, but not too hard!

The Prayer Box - Lisa Wingate

Do you remember those books which as a child totally immersed you? I would sit with my back against my bedroom radiator, book on my knees, lost in the adventures within the pages.  This book has a similar pull.

 

The Prayer Box was originally published in 2013 but Tyndale House have reissued it. An excellent decision! It tells the story of Tandi Reese, a young mother fleeing with 9 year old T.J. and 14 year old Zoey from her abusive and criminal ex. They set up home in a rental cottage in the grounds of a grand historic house in the small town of Fairhope on Hatteras Island but when Tandi finds her 91 year old landlady dead in bed before the end of page 10, her life becomes more complicated than ever. (By the way, this is not a crime novel, so this death is peaceful and from natural causes!) Tasked with cleaning out Iola’s house, she finds 81 prayer boxes, one for each year. Within the boxes is the story of Iola’s life – her hopes, dreams and fears, and the secrets she had kept to her death, written on scraps of paper to ‘Father’ and signed ‘your loving daughter, Iola Anne’.  It is soon clear that these letters are Iola’s prayers.  As Tandi and her family bumpily become part of the Fairhope community, she discovers that love does not always come with conditions, and that family does not always look the way you expect it to.

 

Although set solidly in the present day, Iola’s letters go right back to her childhood.  And the letters are absolutely beautifully written.  There are books in which much of the joy is in the way the prose flows, and this book scores a double whammy: the story is wonderfully told and compelling, and the actual writing is lyrical, especially the letters.  I loved the simple yet not always easy faith of Iola Anne’s letters, and I also loved the development of Tandi’s relationship with her children.  The community is so well described that I could almost feel myself stepping into Sandy’s Seashell Shop.  I can highly recommend spending a few hours in Fairhope.

Whose Waves These Are - Amanda Dykes

Whose Waves These Are is a debut novel which has very deservedly just won the Christy Award Book of the Year 2020. It's written in such a way that you would think the author had years of novel writing experience behind her.  It begins with two brothers over whom the spectre of war looms large.  After the war, a grieving Robert writes a poem and sends it to a local newspaper. In it, he asks people to send rocks out of which he will build a memorial.  When the poem spreads far and wide, the small harbour village of Ansel-by-the-Sea is inundated with rocks, but the building of the memorial does not run smoothly.  

 

Decades later, Annie Sawyer is summoned back to Ansel and her Great-Uncle Bob by another message in a newspaper:

“‘Come home, Annie. Bess.’  There was only one reason Bess would write to her this way. The only reason Bob himself would not write. Something had happened that made it so he couldn’t.”

 

And so Annie heads back to Maine, where she meets the enigmatic harbour postman Jeremiah, tries to work out why Bob has boxes and boxes of rocks, and yearns to heal the rift in her family.

 

The themes of family, secrets, forgiveness and love are woven throughout this story. The characters are so well described that you feel invested in their stories, and there are a number of stories within this book. They’re each carefully and convincingly told – no ‘bit part’ characters here, but rather demonstrations of how grief, love, and hope can cross years and even countries and result in something beautiful.