Football is a whole other thing in the South, Midwestern transplant Jewel Mantelle discovers, and on Sophia Island, they love the Gators. Jewel would be fine with that if her friends only meant the University of Florida football team, but they also seem to love the critters skulking around in the ditches and creeks running through their tiny beach town. At her first ever football party she finds herself front and center for the spectacle of the eccentric Bell Jackson calling the gators behind his huge mansion—and it gives her the creeps.
But finding out those very same gators didn’t hesitate to take a bite of Mr. Jackson when he fell off his balcony and landed in their domain is even creepier.
I started this week before last as an intermittent break from my other book "The Women" by Kristen Hannah. I needed a break because "The Women" is very intense. I took several of these breaks.
The Women is the story of one woman gone to war, but it shines a light on all women who put themselves in harm's way and whose sacrifice and commitment to their country has too often been forgotten. A novel about deep friendships and bold patriotism, The Women is a richly drawn story with a memorable heroine whose idealism and courage under fire will come to define an era.
I finished "The Women" Saturday morning; it was the book choice for the Liberal Ladies Book Club and we all enjoyed it. We had a lively discussion about it. One of the ladies in the group actually spent a year in Nam as a Red Cross social worker and she provided great insight on the reality vs the novel. It's a good read, moves really fast. The author really brings the closeness of the main characters, who began as strangers serving as nurses in Viet Nam. It is one of the best description of the support women can give each other that I have ever read. However we all had issues with the main character's naivete when it came to men (which was interesting considering the variety of age groups in the group - all the way from adults at the time of Viet Nam to young women who were not yet born) All of the younger women want to learn more about the war.
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