Nemesis by Philip Roth

In the stifling heat of Newark, a terrifying epidemic is raging threatening the children of the New Jersey City with maiming, paralysis, lifelong disability and even death. This is the story of a wartime polio epidemic in the summer of 1944 and the effect that it has on a closely knit family oriented Newark community and its children.

At the center of the book, is a vigorous twenty-three year old playground director named Bucky Cantor. Focusing on Cantor's dilemmas as polio begins to ravage his playground and on the everyday realities that he faces, Roth leads us through every inch of emotion that polio brought to a community. Roth depicts a decent energetic man with the best intentions struggling in his own private war against the epidemic. Roth is tenderly exact at every point about Cantor's passage into personal disaster.

Questions are posed such as, what kind of choices fatally shape a life? How does the individual withstand the onslaught of circumstance?

The Lost Wife by Alyson Richman

Josef Kohn is a successful New York obstetrician who still dreams of his first wife, Lenka, an art student he left behind in Czechoslovakia while fleeing the Nazis.

Lenka, who he believes died during the war, continues to haunt his dreams, while his second wife, Amalia, remains more of a ghost to him than is Lenka. As we follow Lenka's journey to the ghetto of Terezin, where she is forced to draft technical drawings for the Germans and is a witness to the secret paintings of an underground group of artists involved in their own form of resistance against their captors, we see not only the endurance of the human spirit, but also of the artist, whose desire to create and document, cannot be extinguished.

From the glamourous of pre-war Prague, to the ensuing horrors of the Nazi Europe, we experience both the dawning of Lenka's and Josef's love affair to its tragic unraveling. Each character must forge their own path for survival and each must struggle to adapt to post-war America, while their secrets, their past and the ghost of their first marriage are only known to them.

The First Wife is a story that explores the depth......the power of first love, the resilience of the human spirit, and our capacity to remember.

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson

Retired British army major Major Ernest Pettigrew, lives in a quaint English village. He is a widower who was deeply in love with his wife. They have one son named Roger. The story begins with his brother's unexpected death from a heart attack and the Major's deep desire to inherit his brother's gun, worth lots of money. He has the mate to the gun.

He begins an unexpected friendship with Mrs. Ali, a Pakistani widow who runs a local shop. This friendship disturbs the bucolic serenity of the town and opens up many questions. What does it mean to belong? What are the obligations of family and tradition when balanced against personal freedom? Will the village by lost because of petty prejudices?

I liked this book very much because Major Pettigrew struggled with loss and moved forward. At first he was lonely even with the many chores and responsibilities that he had. His friendship with Mrs. Ali allowed him to question values, and tradition and grow as a human being. He made mistakes along the way, admitted them and moved forward.

A Dog's Purpose byW. Bruce Cameron

The book tells the story of a dog named Toby who finds himself reincarnated and decides that there must be a reason, a purpose that he must fulfill and until he does so, he will continue to be reborn. The story is narrated by Bailey, who is very much, a dog.

From Toby, the feral dog, to Bailey, Ethan's best friend, to Ellie, the Search and Find dog, and lastly to Buddy, the reincarnated Bailey, I laughed and cried.

Zeitoun by Dave Eggers

Zeitoun is a disturbing, non-fiction account of a New Orleans married couple who were dragged through their own special brand of Kafkaesque hell after Hurricane Katrina.

Left Neglected by Julie Rosen

This was an excellent book. It was similar to Still Alice in that it told the story of Sarah, a multi-tasking successful business woman who was texting on her phone while driving and had a horrible accident that gave her TBI in that she could not "see" her left side even though she was not blind.

The inter-dynamics of the family especially the relationship between the mother and Sarah were wonderful. The book showed Sarah as a strong woman as she was trying to cope with her disability as well as the strength of the family.

This is a MUST read.

The Invisible Bridge by Julie Orringer

This is a tale of war-torn lovers, family and survival of the luckiest rather than the fittest. The Invisible Bridge tells the story of a family shattered and remade in history's darkest hour. The book moves from the small Hungarian town of Konyar, to the grand opera houses of Budapest and Paris. It moves from the despair of the Carpathian winter to an unimaginable life in the labor camps. It tells the story of Andras Levi, a Hungarian-Jewish architecture student who arrives in Paris in 1937, from Budapest with a scholarship, a single suitcase, and a mysterious letter that he has promised to deliver. He falls into a complicated relationship with the letter's recipient and becomes privy to a secret that will alter the course of his and his family's history.

It's a wonderful book. And I'm proud to say that I'm going to review it for the Sisterhood Book club.