This is my first book review. Which isn't so much a review as it's just a bunch of sentences thrown together, trying to make sense, but not quite succeeding. Enjoy.
Rated PG
This book took me quite awhile to read. But that's probably because I read it mainly at night...unless I felt like I was at a good part in the story, and only then would I pick it up during the day. There was never a part of the book that I wouldn't allow my kids to read.. Although it's adult themed so kids just wouldn't be interested in it. There were times even I wasn't interested in it. I've read two other books written by this same author and this one has been my least favorite.
It's a story about Conrad, a seventy five year old widow who sees an angel in the garden that he and his late wife Rose cultivated and loved for years. The appearance of the angel sets off a series of events that turn life in their small town upside down. Since it was about a garden, there were a lot of flower names that were hard to pronounce. I just skipped over them but it left me feeling as if I missed out on something since I could neither pronounce the name of the flower or picture it in my head.
It's also a story about pelicans which are actually more interesting that I thought they were. But to be honest, they still weren't that interesting.
Believe it or not, the garden, the pelicans, the angel and Conrad and Rose are all intertwined in someway throughout the story.
The book is set in the present with flashbacks of the couples life together. However the author drags out the telling of the life of Conrad and Rose and so at times, I don't feel as if I'm experiencing the book but just standing by as a disinterested third party.
But I really liked the parts of the story that took us back to their life together. It's just that it happened too infrequently. I really felt that those were the best parts of the book. The author made seemingly small, inconsequential and ordinary life events seem extraordinary.
I finished this book last night and now having had awhile to think about it, it just feels like a sad book with a few graceful moments that makes Conrad and Rose's life together seem miraculous.
And I wouldn't read it again.
