All of a sudden, Faye finds herself traveling back in time to connect with her mom and the two develop an emotional bond. Because she lost her own mother thirty years prior, she always wants to make sure her children have the mother’s love that she always longed for. Married with two girls, thirty-seven-year-old Faye makes it a priority to let her daughters know daily that they are loved beyond measure. Faye, Faraway by Helen Fisherįaye, Faraway is magical realism at its finest and will give you all the feels. Much of her storyline is related to Christian’s own life, who desired to make a book with all women represented. Noni Blake is a queer, plus-sized woman finding her place in this crazy world.
If your book club is the place you go to vent about the pressures of daily life, then you can escape with Noni’s story about leaving it all behind. It’s Been a Pleasure, Noni Blakeby Claire Christian Definitely recommended.Feature image credit: always something so exciting about starting a new year especially when we get to make our book club reading plan, too! There are a lot of exciting books coming out in 2021, but these picks are perfect for your next book club selection because regardless of the genre, they’re thought-provoking and easy to discuss. It's unique characters and structure will make it a story I won't soon forget. This section of the novel veered just a bit into melodrama for me, but I still very much enjoyed the characters and their deep and evident love for their friend Leila.Not a perfect novel, but certainly one I enjoyed. Each memory is sparked by a sense - the smell of a wood burning stove, homemade strawberry cake - and these memories allow the reader a glimpse of the joy and sorrow that made up Leila's remarkable life.The second section - "Body" - starts where Leila's mind has finally stopped, and tells the story of her five closest friends and their efforts to give her the burial she deserves. What we read is the ten minutes and 38 seconds following her death, in which her still active mind is remembering important events and people from her life. Shafak divides her book into two main sections, and in the first - "Mind" - our protagonist, Leila, is already dead.
Science has come to understand that a person's mind can still remain active for up to 10 minutes after the body is dead. The construction of the novel was quite unique, and I found it particularly effective. I'm always on board for a good friendship story, and this book had many I was also hooked from the beginning by Elif Shafak's beautiful writing style. I very much enjoyed this novel about a murdered prostitute from Istanbul and the friends who ultimately saved her.
Chapter 1: 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World.
This is a dark, violent world, but Leila is tough and open to beauty, light, and the essential bonds of friendship. Escaping to Istanbul, Leila makes her way into the sordid industry of sex trafficking, finding a home in the city's historic Street of Brothels. Tequila Leila's memories bring us back to her childhood in the provinces, a highly oppressive milieu with religion and traditions, shaped by a polygamous family with two mothers and an increasingly authoritarian father. While the Turkish sun rises and her friends sleep soundly nearby, she remembers her life-and the lives of others, outcasts like her. Her heart has stopped beating but her brain is still active-for 10 minutes 38 seconds. In the pulsating moments after she has been murdered and left in a dumpster outside Istanbul, Tequila Leila enters a state of heightened awareness. Named a Best Book of the Year by Bookpage, NPR, Washington Post, and The EconomistĪ moving novel on the power of friendship in our darkest times, from internationally renowned writer and speaker Elif Shafak.