Ann Napolitano

I just loved this one. Loosely inspired by Little Women, the Padavano sisters grow up in Chicago in a tight-knit household. The story follows them through the decades as love and loss create barriers in their lives. The author explores the idea that we are shaped by our family, both their presence and absence. The rotating POV (William, Julia, and Sylvie) gives us a chance to glimpse the same events through different eyes. It's hard to explain how deeply this one hit me. I missed the show more characters when I finished it. I can't wait to read Napolitano next work. Her gorgeous prose made me feel like I was wandering the aisles of Sylvie's library, glancing up at Cecelia's murals that dotted their Chicago neighborhood, and that I could pop into Emeline's home to say hello.

SPOILERS
With Charlie’s death, the Padavana women realize all of the intangible depth and understanding he added to their lives. It made me think about how our society struggles to value certain gifts that people have. We appreciate the tangible, but don’t always recognize other skills that are less concrete, like empathy and kindness.

“Charlie’s and Silvie’s deaths were now part of Julia’s topography; the losses ran like a river inside her.“
SPOILERS OVER

“When an old person dies,” Kent said, “even if that person is wonderful, he or she is still somewhat ready, and so are the people who loved them. They’re like old trees, whose roots have loosened in the ground. They fall gently. But when someone like your aunt Sylvie dies—before her time—her roots get pulled out and the ground is ripped up. Everyone nearby is in danger of being knocked over.”

“The fact that he had failed meant he had to continue to walk forward with his life history—his mistakes—slung over his shoulders like a heavy backpack. This fact exhausted him, but he was too tired to reject it.” show less

The Padavano sisters – Julia, Sylvie, and twins Emeline and Cecelia – are part of a close-knit Chicago family. Despite their parents’ unhappy marriage, the sisters are loved and nurtured, especially by their father Charlie. Their personalities are quite different, but they support one another through thick and thin.

In college Julia meets William, who hides the scars from a completely different upbringing. William is immediately accepted by the Padavanos, and he happily immerses himself show more in their love. Julia, a take-charge sort of person, sets about molding William and their relationship to fit her ideal. It would appear they are heading for the classic happy ending … until they aren’t. Their conflict has ripple effects through the entire family, and redirects the course of their lives over the next 25 years.

My favorite parts of this novel were Charlie, whose presence was palpable even when he was “off-screen,” and the relationship between the sisters prior to the central conflict. As time progressed there were certain elements of the story that seemed less believable to me, and the ending was perhaps a bit too tidy. But if you like a good family saga (and I do), you’ll enjoy this one. show less

I don't get the hype for this book. It's a novel about the relations among four sisters, and has been described as an "homage" to "Little Women". Indeed, the sisters continually compare themselves to the March sisters (not the only repetitiveness in the book), but there really is no resemblance. It's an easy read, but the writing is pedestrian. Napolitano does a lot of "telling", rather than "showing". She doesn't sufficiently develop her characters, so that their behavior seems absurd and show more their motivations for their actions aren't clear or seem nonsensical.

On top of that, she obviously didn't do her research. The book is set primarily in Chicago and Evanston at very specific times (each chapter is headed with the dates in which it occurs). You can't just hop a bus from Pilsen to Northwestern University, and nobody in their right mind would walk from Northwestern to Pilsen, as she has one character do. There is no part of Chicago that is called "midtown". If you're going to set a book in a specific place and time, be accurate.

But her most egregious offense was to have one sister, Sylvie, work at the Lozano Branch of the Chicago Public Library, beginning in 1974. The Lozano Branch did not open until 1989. Napolitano says in her acknowledgements that she deliberately had it exist "a few years" before then (sorry, FIFTEEN years is not "a few"). This is absolutely infuriating. Rudy Lozano was a labor activist and community organizer who, in 1983, at the age of 31, was murdered because of his activism. The library is named in his honor and has a permanent exhibit celebrating his life. Napolitano erases that history, insulting his memory. I don't like it when authors play games with history, but I don't think I've ever been so angry about it as I am with Napolitano. She owes his family and the community an apology. show less

Ann Napolitano has written a novel that is as good and as uncomfortable as one of Flannery O’Connor’s stories. A Good Hard Look recreates Flannery’s hometown of Milledgeville, Georgia in the 1960’s. The story starts the night before the wedding of the town’s most beautiful Southern Bell, Cookie Himmel and her wealthy fiancé Melvin Whiteson. Cookie has everything planned; she knows what she wants in life, and Melvin thinks he is ready to start over in her world. Until he meets show more Flannery O’Connor, whose brutal honesty and her revealing descriptions of the people around her, has always upset Cookie. At the time of the wedding, Flannery, who suffered from lupus, is home and recuperating on her family farm, Andalusia. She is under the care of her mother Regina, and surrounded by her beloved peacocks. That night, the peacocks’ unearthly cries start a ruckus upsetting the town and the wedding guests. They are an important element of this tale, their voices do more than disturb the peace; they set up the underlying emotional current that leads them all to tragedy.

Ann’s book is an unflinching look at human nature and why it’s so hard to change. It’s true to life characters stayed in my thoughts long after I finished the last page. Caution: there are adult situations and one character smokes marijuana. I read an advanced uncorrected copy so I can’t quote any of the fabulous lines Ann wrote, but her imagery grabs your heart. I received this book through Amazon Vine. show less