A blog reader recently suggested the audio book The Shoemaker’s Wife: A Novel
I started out intently listening. I loved the story.
It started in the early 1900’s and was wonderful. The reader was good. The tale was good but honestly, I slowed my listening as I went and I couldn’t figure out why. Then it hit me. Books that try to cover too much time in one single book aren’t my favorite. With this book, WWI happened over the course of one or two chapters..with a fast forward to WWII and that took even less time. It was a good story, in fact I loved the story, but I just wasn’t a fan of the speed that the book took.
Here is what Amazon had to say, “Beloved New York Times bestselling author Adriana Trigiani returns with the most epic and ambitious novel of her career—a breathtaking multigenerational love story that spans two continents, two World Wars, and the quest of two star-crossed lovers to find each other again. The Shoemaker’s Wife is replete with the all the page-turning adventure, sumptuous detail, and heart-stopping romance that has made Adriana Trigiani, “one of the reigning queens of women’s fiction” (USA Today). Fans of Trigiani’s sweeping family dramas like Big Stone Gap and Lucia, Lucia will love her latest masterpiece, a book Kathryn Stockett, author of The Help, calls “totally new and completely wonderful: a rich, sweeping epic which tells the story of the women and men who built America dream by dream.””
Amazon readers say 4.4 stars. I’d say 4. I think it’s mostly because I would have loved to see this turned into two books and the pace slowed.
Thanks for the recommendation…
I think that it is interesting that you think it should have been two books. I do too. There were times I felt like I didn’t get as much story in parts of the book, like they skipped over big chunks of life. I am glad you like the story thought.