Bloggy Book Club!

For the month of February...I read firefly lane by Kristin Hannah, it was recommended by a friend I have known for almost 30 years! We are not childhood friends which lets you know right off how old I am...which is okay, I am very comfortable telling people my age. I like being 50, as I am becoming comfortable with who I am and the choices I have made and I actually enjoy reflecting back on my life with love and nostalgia. I haven't always felt that way about my life.

This book is well written and the story is one that brought me into it immediately and I think everyone can relate to friendships. I love the time period that the novel is set in...middle 70's! Music and current references drew me back into my own personal life experiences right away, the first chapter, part one, The Seventies, Dancing Queen...young and sweet, only seventeen...My Anthem...I was hooked!

The book cover states...
In the turbulent summer of 1974, Kate Mularky has accepted her place at the bottom of the eighth-grade social food chain. Then, to her amazement, the "coolest girl in the world" moves in across the street and wants to be her friend. Tully Hart seems to have it all beauty, brains, ambition. On the surface they are opposite as two people could be: Kate, doomed forever to be uncool, with a loving family who mortifies her at every turn. Tully, steeped in glamor and mystery, but with a secret that is destroying her. They make a pact to be friends forever; by summer's end they are "TullyandKate." Inseparable.

I enjoyed this book and thought of it, long after I finished the book! I was frustrated with the actions of one of the characters...to the point of telling my daughter the entire story and arguing for my reasoning of why the author failed in this particular aspect. I ended with how can I criticize her story...it's the story I find fault with...not her writing! My daughter listened and then said...
"You can criticize her story...she needs to make you believe it!" and then she said " But, Mom...I think she did her job as a author...You care about this story and are thinking about it and discussing it!
I did enjoy this book...
I had trouble with the Kate character, I couldn't find any real trauma in her life to justify her lack of ownership for her own life. I still can not understand her insecurities that continued into adulthood and especially her insecurities about her marriage in regards to her very best friend's relationship with her husband. These were friends that had a relationship built on some insecurities in eighth grade...the lack of honest dialogue between these two characters would have made the life long relationship impossible to maintain...in my opinion. The relationships that I did find very interesting was all the Mother/Daughter relationships interwoven between all the "TullyandKate" moments...I think that would have made the better and more believable story! Those relationships all seemed authentic to me...I believed them all! Kate's character I just didn't buy into...she had a pretty typical childhood...a lot of us have home lives like this...She didn't have a "Carrie" moment...she was "average" to the point of being invisible but I couldn't find a reason to believe her actions or lack of actions in regards to her adult life. She had parents who loved her and yet in many ways she was portrayed as a insecure eighth grader until the end!

Overall, I enjoyed this book, frustrated with one character's portrayal, but I enjoyed the story!

Does anyone know a very normal person who can not tell the two people she is supposedly closest to that she is insecure about their relationship? I mean, insecure about it for years...