I will admit that had I just seen this book on the shelf I wouldn't have been attracted it, I would have more likely than not passed it by and not read it. But for two things I had to, I have read, and will read, each Barnes and Noble Book Club Book AND I am leading the discussion for this book. So I read it. And I liked it. I mean I liked it way more than I thought I would by reading the blurb inside the jacket so I am glad I was "forced" to read it.
The Last Romantics is the story of a family like many families, there are good times and bad, struggles and victories, falling out and coming together, love and loss, after all those are the things that make families right? So it is about ordinary life, with all of the things that make it far from ordinary. I guess that doesn't sound all the gripping but it was. Maybe it was the flashback fashion of the telling, maybe it was the naked realness of the lives of the Skinners, or maybe it is the poetic flow of Conklin's writing. What ever it is, IT works.
Fiona is our guide through the story of her family. She is at the start of our journey, a 102 year old published, famous, poet and is telling us a story that starts in 1981 and spans many years. And I mean many, because she is telling the story from 2079. Don't roll your eyes, this works. She is talking to an auditorium full of people and begins to tell the story of her and her siblings after a young lady asks her a question about her most famous poem.
At it's most basic The Last Romantics isn't about romance but it is about love. The ugliness, the sweetness, the beauty and joy, and the pain.
I am looking forward to talking about this story with the group on Tuesday March 7!!
(Finished February 28, 2019)
No comments:
Post a Comment