Do you remember how I was trying to get out of a reading slump?
Well, this is the book that got me out of it.
My Name Is Lucy Barton was released last year, in January 2016. I heard so many great reviews about this author that I pre-ordered it after reading the synopsis. This story follows a lady named Lucy Barton. She is married with two young daughters, and she lives in New York City.
She hasn’t always lived in New York City. In fact, during a long hospital stay, her mother comes to visit her. She and her mother haven’t seen each other much and they haven’t spoken much, either, since Lucy left their small town to go to college. As Lucy lays in the hospital bed, she and her mother travel down memory lane. They talk a lot about Lucy’s childhood, when they were poor in a small farming town in the midwest. Their conversations are fueled by gossip about the people from Lucy’s childhood. The story of Lucy’s childhood slowly unravels.
And that’s all I’m going to say about that. It’s one of those books that is best when you go in knowing little.
Lucy and her mother’s relationship is very strained, which was the main reason I wanted to read it. In general, I like reading dysfunctional family stories. This story is a little sad. So, if that’s something you don’t like, I wouldn’t read it. There’s nothing specifically sad about it, other than the fact that Lucy left her family behind to achieve her dreams. Lucy isn’t malicious about achieving her dreams. It was just painfully obvious that she was different from everyone else in her family and town. She really had to leave in order to grow up.
Have you read this? What did you think?