The Summer of Rainbow Rowell

Check out her website–she’s so fun!

In most books, I find something that I like.  It might be the uniqueness of the plot, the strength of one of the characters, the time period in which the story is set…endless possibilities of cool attractions a book can hold.  At the beginning of this summer, though, it had been a while since I found a book I truly loved.

One that carried me away and swept me up in its world.

One that I couldn’t put down and didn’t want to put down.

One that made losing all that sleep in the wee hours totally worth it…

And then, somehow I met up with Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell and was a complete goner.  I couldn’t exactly put my finger on why I loved the book so much if I tried; I just delighted in being caught up in Cath’s world.  In the warmth and love of the college-age characters, in the tender sweetness of new love, and the slow unveiling of the realization that in staying true to ourselves, we are far stronger than we might imagine.

I was so taken with Fangirl, that I bought it.  I haven’t bought a book in years, but I desperately wanted to hold onto this one and read again–and make sure everyone near and dear to me read it too.  I then immediately put all three of Rowell’s other books on hold, counting down the days until her most recent, Landline, would be released on July 8.

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In Eleanor and Park, I visited the world of fiery teen facing a horrible battle.  Attachments hit all the funny and poignant notes of relationships and employment in today’s twenty-something world.  And then Landline blew me away by revealing some of the most true truths of parenthood I will ever know.

On page 220-221 of Landline, Rowell reached out and grabbed my heart with the words,

“Georgie was pretty sure that having kids was the worst thing you could do to a marriage.  Sure you could survive it. You could survive a giant boulder falling on your head–that didn’t mean that it was good for you.  Kids took a fathomless amount of time and energy…And they took it first. They had first right of refusal on everything you had to offer.

Having kids sent a tornado through your marriage, then made you happy for the devastation.  Even if you could rebuild everything just the way it was before, you’d never want to.”

Wow. WOW.  The rawness, the realness, and the honesty of these lines are magnificent, especially to this mom, who spends about 99% of her day figuring she must be doing something wrong because it’s so darn hard.

Rowell’s writing is like a sweet, welcome gut punch of the vulnerability that is within us all as we travel through life’s stages, And I can’t get over how classily she takes readers on this journey without relying on unnecessary shock factors or salacious content.  She allows her fantastically-developed characters stand on their own, telling beautiful stories of self-discovery.

It’s been a good summer, a great summer, for many reasons, but in my book, it’s Rainbow Rowell for the win with her books.  What a perfect summer treasure.  Thanks, Rowell.

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What have YOU read this summer?  I can’t get enough chatting about books, so let me know below!  And if you’re looking for some more recommendations, check out the titles my Facebook friends shared:

Jen of People I Want to Punch in the Throat –anything by Tana French and the Game of Thrones series (she has finally convinced me to dig into this epic series!)

Michelle of Frazzled Shell—Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty (I LOVED this book!)

Rebecca–the Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich (or anything by her, really) and The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Claire

Barbara—The Enemy series by Charles Higson &  Ken Follett’s new Edge of Eternity in The Century Trilogy.

Jenn of Something Clever 2.0–Anything by Vonnegut, especially Breakfast of Champions, & anything by Christopher Moore (but she recommends starting with Lamb)

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And I continue to regularly stalk books on Goodreads, so please join me there too.  Happy reading, friends!

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Meredith

Meredith blogs at The Mom of the Year, where she dedicatedly earns her title one epic parenting fail at a time, offering quick, relatable laughs for fellow parents and all their empathizers. She has been part of several best-selling anthologies, featured on prominent sites such as Huffington Post, In the Powder Room and BlogHer, and loves her role as the Executive VP/Operations Manager of The BlogU Conference. When she's not breaking up fights over Legos and juice boxes, she remains fully committed to sharing a less serious look at the world of parenting.

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