The Mountaintop School for Dogs by Ellen Cooney

* The Mountaintop School for Dogs, published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, is scheduled to be released Aug. 5, 2014.

About the Book (from amazon.com): Sanctuary. Place of refuge. Training school. Command center for The Network. Home for strays and rescued dogs. Evie is stuck at The Inn, managed by the stern and mysterious Mrs. Auberchon, although she’s supposed to join a training program at The Sanctuary. That’s what she signed up for—never mind that she lied and doesn’t know the first thing about animals except what she’s learned from a breed guide, from the notes someone keeps leaving, and from videos online, like one that asks: Please can more people be nicer to dogs? Once up on the mountain with staffers, volunteers, and her dog students, Evie takes notes on the new things she’s learning. Alpha. Forgiveness. Play. Rehabilitation. Like the racing greyhound who refuses to move, the golden retriever who returns every time he’s adopted, and the rottweiler who’s a hopeless candidate for search-and-rescue, Evie came from a troubled past. She writes: “Rescue. Best. Verb. Ever.” As she creates her own training manual, she may even write an entry on herself. A worthy shelf-mate to books by Garth Stein and Carolyn Parkhurst, this is a brilliantly engaging novel about finding fellow animals who may bring you a deeper sense of home, healing, and the power of inventing a future.

"Abandon. To Turn away on purpose from someone you were supposed to never turn away from. Bad verb. Bad word. Bad everything." (page 43)

My Thoughts: 

     As a dog owner, I could easily relate to this book. Dogs often teach us more than we teach them. They follow our commands in order to receive a desired response but soon they command us with a simple tilt of their head and a gazing stare. I have a five-year-old Sheltie and love her abundantly, however, she tests my patience daily. But once you allow a pet into your home and heart, you are forever changed. 

     The Mountaintop School for Dogs is a story about second chances for all living creatures. The reader is introduced to a variety of characters, some four legged, that are searching for their place in life, a place to call home. When Evie arrives at The Inn and the School, she is lonely and lost. Recovering from past mistakes, she quickly discovers that her own existence isn't that different from the dogs that she encounters. She too is searching for acceptance and finds a kindred spirit in Mrs. Auberchon, The Inn's keeper. Their relationship takes a while to develop just as it takes Evie's students a while to warm up to her. There is a need to assess the expectations and intentions of another before you can reach a level of comfort.

     Evie quickly learns that her inexperience as a dog trainer has left her ill equipped to handle the challenges that arise for rescue missions. I can't even watch the ASPCA commercials. You know the ones- cue the Sarah McLachlin tune in the background....heartbreaking. 

"Because sometimes you don't call it abuse when it's happening to you, even if you're doing it to yourself. You just call it 'my life'." (Page 262)

     The dogs at the school are is a stage of readjustment. They have been rescued from situations of neglect, abuse, or abandonment from those that initially cared for them. Evie is readjusting as well, realizing that you can't run away from your past but you can control your present. She is a strong lead character that the reader cheers on as she improves in the training and care of the canine students, creating a rescue for herself with each achievement, and finding joy in the smallest of progress. Although at a different stage in life, Mrs. Auberchon confronts her own fears and misgivings as she allows herself to be more accepting of others and a new way of life.

"She ran hot water on the label until it loosened enough to peel off. The bottle was too attractive to throw away. It didn't have to come to its end. It could have another life, perhaps as a vase, perhaps as a candleholder, bright wax dripping down its sides, hardening, lasting, staying. She filled the sink with sudsy water and stuck it in there to soak." (Page 143)

     I thought this passage was a beautiful analogy of how we humans, just like our recycling projects, can be transformed. Sometimes all we need is a little trust and self acceptance. The Mountaintop School for Dogs is a wonderful story for reminding us of the importance of compassion and the impact of a second chance for all living creatures.

* I received this book as an Advanced Reader Copy from Houghton Mifflin. The reading recommendation is entirely my own.

Happy Reading,

Rebecca

Book Beginnings: The Mountaintop School for Dogs

Today I am linking up to Book Beginnings hosted by Rose City Reader where readers share the first sentence of the current book they are reading.

The Mountaintop School for Dogs: And Other Second Chances 
by Ellen Cooney

"It was dusk on a winter day, and from high on the mountain came barking, drifting down above the snow like peals of a bell, one, two, three, four, more, just to say the light was leaving, but that was all right: here I am, I'm a dog, all is well."

Thoughts on Intro: I love how animated this book begins. From the introduction, the reader gets the sense that the dogs are going to be key characters as well. As a dog owner myself, I am really excited to read this story. There is much that animals can teach us and they provide a unique energy that offers such joy! The Mountaintop School for Dogs is sure to be a terrific read for those with four-legged friends!

About the Book (from amazon.com): Sanctuary. Place of refuge. Training school. Command center for The Network. Home for strays and rescued dogs. Evie is stuck at The Inn, managed by the stern and mysterious Mrs. Auberchon, although she’s supposed to join a training program at The Sanctuary. That’s what she signed up for—never mind that she lied and doesn’t know the first thing about animals except what she’s learned from a breed guide, from the notes someone keeps leaving, and from videos online, like one that asks: Please can more people be nicer to dogs? Once up on the mountain with staffers, volunteers, and her dog students, Evie takes notes on the new things she’s learning. Alpha. Forgiveness. Play. Rehabilitation. Like the racing greyhound who refuses to move, the golden retriever who returns every time he’s adopted, and the rottweiler who’s a hopeless candidate for search-and-rescue, Evie came from a troubled past. She writes: “Rescue. Best. Verb. Ever.” As she creates her own training manual, she may even write an entry on herself. A worthy shelf-mate to books by Garth Stein and Carolyn Parkhurst, this is a brilliantly engaging novel about finding fellow animals who may bring you a deeper sense of home, healing, and the power of inventing a future.

* The Mountaintop School for Dogs, published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, is scheduled to be released Aug. 5, 2014.

My Furbaby, Chloe

You can read by review of Cooney's Thanksgiving here 

and my review of Cooney's Lambrusco here.

About the Author:
Ellen Cooney was born in 1952 in Clinton, Massachusetts. She is the author of eight novels and stories published in The New Yorker and many literary journals. She has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Massachusetts Artists Foundation, and taught creative writing for over twenty-five years, most recently in the writing program at MIT. She now lives in mid-coast Maine.


Happy Reading,
Rebecca

Thanksgiving by Ellen Cooney

"Hester sees they need God to look in the direction of this house and set in motion a mighty splash of light, sweeping through this room like a broom." (Thanksgiving, Ellen Cooney)

About the Book: One family. One table. One meal. 350 years. This dramatic, highly inventive novel presents the story of one family through many generations, as Thanksgiving dinner is prepared. The narrative moves swiftly and richly through time and changes as we experience the lives of the Morleys against the background of historical events. This is history that comes fully alive, for we become part of the family ourselves, sharing their fortunes and tragedies, knowing their truths from their lies, watching their possessions handed down or lost forever. All along, in the same house, in the same room, Morley women are getting dinner ready, one part at a time, in a room that begins with a hearth of Colonial times and ends as a present-day kitchen. Thanksgiving serves up history in a lively, entertaining way that offers an original viewpoint of the everyday concerns of one family across the generations.

My Thoughts: It's September, which means that Halloween decorations are showcasing store shelves and television is filled with all sorts of ghosts, goblins, and zombies to scare us. October is right around the corner and by its end, red, green, and gold-glittered everything will be on display for a shopping experience comprised of things we don't need and never knew we wanted until the flashy advertising entranced us into thinking our lives would be improved if only we owned this or that. And somewhere in the middle, slightly less prominent with each passing year lies Thanksgiving in her quiet gratitude.

     Did you ever have a book find its way to you when you were in most need of what it had to offer? Today our lives revolve around "post-worthy" events and activities to share on social media with our "friends." Do you remember when you only "shared" with those that were present? When family dinners were about creating dishes from recipes that had been passed down for generations to enjoy with those around the table and not about capturing a program-enhanced photo of a store-bought dessert?

     Thanksgiving by Ellen Cooney begins in a quiet descriptive of the life and times of early settlers in 1662 Massachusetts. As the years quickly progress in this saga of the Morley family, the characters and the lives they lead become much louder. While the early Morleys long for tools to make life more simple such as the modern technology that fills our homes today but were unimaginable in their time, the later Morleys find themselves somewhat nostalgic about the simplicity and hand-crafted ways of the past.

     Thanksgiving explores the bonds of family over many generations and the roots that ultimately tie them together even as they venture outward on their own. Home is much more than a house. For the Morleys, the house and land they have inhabited for centuries is both their beginning and end. "Pearl says the worst things her own ears ever heard was the sound the door never made, opening to reveal the first Roger, home from the war. The house is still holding that silence, Pearl says." 
     It is the mystery of what really happened within the walls of the old Morley house that keeps each generation intrigued, so many secrets never told, dreams never shared. "And of all those things, done and not-done, when you come right down to it, what have you actually got? You actually only have the things that someone was willing to pass along. And of the things passed along, you have to wonder, how many of them are the truth?"
     Throughout the book, it is the care of the dinner and food preparation that unites each story told up to 2012. The traditional food that remains the holiday staples today- pumpkins, squash, cranberries, turkey, yams, potatoes, rolls- are in many ways additional characters. When the parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme are dried hanging in the kitchen eaves, something magical seems to have taken place. The reader follows the Morleys through their struggles and achievements, love and heartbreaks, births and deaths. And while each of the characters come to life on the page with their own unique personality, it is the house that is at the center of the realm, waiting to open its doors to a new Morley seeking refuse from storm.
     In our ever changing world where each new day seems to process faster, Thanksgiving is the perfect reminder that sometimes all we need to do is slow down, then stop...and celebrate the blessings of family, food, and home sweet home.

 About the Publisher: Publerati specializes in fine fiction for e-books, donating all of its e-books and a portion of its sales to the Worldreader Organization's efforts to provide e-readers and e-books to teachers and children in developing nations for free to promote literacy. To purchase this book for your specific e-reader, visit www.publerati.com.

** Learn more about Author Ellen Cooney on my Book Beginnings post here.

Book Club Suggestions: For the discussion meeting, have each member bring their favorite Thanksgiving dinner dish and share the recipe with the group; Take turns allowing each member to share what they are thankful for this year; Discuss family rituals that take place on Thanksgiving or heirlooms that are brought out of storage for the special day; Have members research an ancestor before the meeting and share their discoveries with the group.

Happy Reading!
Rebecca

Book Beginnings: Thanksgiving by Ellen Cooney

 Today I am linking up to Book Beginnings hosted by Rose City Reader where readers share the first sentence of the current book they are reading.

1662
The Turkey

"The fire is nearly out. In her hurry to flame it, she rushes through the daydark and bumps herself hard on the cradle. She keeps forgetting it's there, planed smooth as skin, still tight in the rockers, still smelling new-woody."

I love the uncommon descriptive words Cooney creates to set the scene of this 1662 day and home- "daydark," "new-woody." The reader can instantly sense that the character's daily routines are very physical, from keeping a fire going to caring for a baby and all the other household chores that we know await her. I am looking forward to reading this novel as it seems to be the perfect book to digest before the start of the holiday season.

** You can read my review of Cooney's previous novel, Lambrusco, here.

About Thanksgiving:

One family. One table. One meal. 350 years. This dramatic, highly inventive novel presents the story of one family through many generations, as Thanksgiving dinner is prepared. The narrative moves swiftly and richly through time and changes as we experience the lives of the Morleys against the background of historical events. This is history that comes fully alive, for we become part of the family ourselves, sharing their fortunes and tragedies, knowing their truths from their lies, watching their possessions handed down or lost forever. All along, in the same house, in the same room, Morley women are getting dinner ready, one part at a time, in a room that begins with a hearth of Colonial times and ends as a present-day kitchen. Thanksgiving serves up history in a lively, entertaining way that offers an original viewpoint of the everyday concerns of one family across the generations.

** Thanksgiving is available on Sept. 15. Visit the author's website to order or learn more at www.ellencooney.com.

About the Author:
Ellen Cooney was born in 1952 in Clinton, Massachusetts. She is the author of eight novels and stories published in The New Yorker and many literary journals. She has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Massachusetts Artists Foundation, and taught creative writing for over twenty-five years, most recently in the writing program at MIT. She now lives in mid-coast Maine. Her next novel, The Mountaintop School For Dogs And Other Second Chances, will be published in the spring of 2014 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.


Happy Reading,
Rebecca

Lambrusco by Ellen Cooney

From the Cover:
     The year is 1943. The Nazis have invaded Italy; American troops have landed. At Aldo's restaurant on the Adriatic coast, Lucia Fantini, wife of the late Aldo, has entertained customers for years with her marvelous opera singing, but normal operations have ceased; the restaurant has been seized by nazifascisti, and a Resistance squad of waiters and local tradesmen have been formed, led by Lucia's son, Beppino. When he disappears after acting on his own to destroy a German truck, Lucia asks, "What kind of a partisan are you, blowing something up without telling your mother?" and sets off to look for him.
     Lucia is aided in her efforts by a richly drawn cast of characters, including Annmarie Malone, the U.S. Army Intelligence officer who was a professional golfer back home; Tito Rocuzzi, the butcher who taught neighborhood dogs to pee on Fascists' boots; Etto Renzetti, the factory owner who scoffs at Dante; and Ugo Fantini, Aldo's physician cousin, who has reasons of his own for wanting to be near Lucia.
     Lucia's journey across war-devastated Italy is operatic in scope and intensity. Ellen Cooney has drawn on her heritage as a third-generation Italian American  to invoke not only a country in crisis but also its literature, its moods, and most of all, its music. This is a tale of lyrical grace and an effervescent comic spirit to match the wine that nourishes them all- Lambrusco.

My Ponderings:
     I had not heard of this book prior to purchasing it. The lovely cover art is what first intrigued me. I love to read a book that draws me into a different culture. Lambrusco by Ellen Cooney is an immersion into WWII Italy. The days are bleak as the lead character and narrator, Lucia Fantini, takes the reader on a heart-wrenching tour of the country as she unsuccessfully tries to locate her missing son and find her voice along the way.
     Along the way, we discover the cost innocent civilians pay as their cities and country become occupied by the enemy, and the tragedies which occur not only to Italians but to the land itself. Although the setting is dark, it is a story about rebuilding- a widow learning how to create a new life for herself and a country determined to survive and keep its heritage alive.
     Often written in a stream of consciousness narration, the reader experiences each scene through Lucia's thoughts and recollections, even encountering her hallucinations after a head injury. Through the numerous characters, one sees how war leaves no life untouched. We travel along with them in a story set to musical composition. Underlying each memory and event is opera, the music of Italian legends.
     A beloved opera singer herself, Lucia discovers that her quest is not only to find her son, but to find herself- the courage to own her voice and use it to proclaim the love that she has remained silent about for far too long.


Happy Reading!
Rebecca

An Italian Adventure

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?
"It's Monday! What Are You Reading?" is a meme hosted by Sheila from Book Journey where readers share what they are currently reading, recently read, or plan to read next.

I am currently reading "Lambrusco" by Ellen Cooney, author of "A Private Hotel for Gentle Ladies."

From inside the cover: "The extraordinary Resistance movement of the Italian people during the Second World War is brought to life in a captivating, deeply moving story of a mother's search for her son."

I recently finished reading Agatha Christie's "Murder on the Orient Express." This was my book club's latest selection and it was marvelous! I definitely plan to read more of Christie if I can ever get through the stack of books I already have.

Book Giveaway

My new giveaway is a hardcover copy of "The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing" by Melissa Bank. From amazon.com: Hailed by critics as the debut of a major literary voice, The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing has captivated readers and dominated bestseller lists. Generous-hearted and wickedly insightful, it maps the progress of Jane Rosenal as she sets out on a personal and spirited expedition through the perilous terrain of sex, love, relationships, and the treacherous waters of the workplace. With an unforgettable comic touch, Bank skillfully teases out universal issues, puts a clever, new spin on the mating dance, and captures in perfect pitch what it's like to be a young woman coming of age in America today.

*** To enter, simply state in your comment that you are interested in this giveaway. The deadline to enter is Sunday, Aug. 19.

Happy Reading!

Rebecca