I normally like Trigiani's books as little escapes into another slice of life. I've enjoyed this series about Valentine a great deal, watching her grow, and make life decisions. I've also enjoyed the depiction of "the big Italian-American family" and how much it resembles other "big fill-in-the-blank-ethnicity families I know. Also, the design process for shoes that has threaded through the books has been fascinating. This book carried a lot of Trigiani's skill as a script writer, often enabling me to more clearly "see" the scene in my mind as I read. Unfortunately, I didn't always like what I was seeing, in regards to some of Valentine's decisions and approaches to sharing your life with your lover and your work. I'm not saying that I don't believe a woman should have a career, because that's definitely not true. I just found myself wanting to smack Valentine, and point to the words "Compromise" and "Share" in the dictionary. If I'd wanted that much marital discord in my light reading, I'd pick up <I>Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolfe</i> or <i>War of the Roses </i>.
I do read the author's notes and afterwards in books, and was interested to see how much of this one/series was based on a cousin of Trigiani.Based on that paragraph, I also have a hunch where the story is going from here. If the next book falls into my hands (as this one did), I'll pick it up. If not, I'm fine with where Valentine and I are in our relationship.
Rounding up to 3/5stars, because even though I didn't like the story as much as some of the others, the writing carried the images very clearly to mind.
Tags:
an-author-i-read, give-me-my-time-back, part-start-of-a-series, read, thought-i-was-gonna-like
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