The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Schaffer and Annie Barrows

"I wonder how the book got to Guernsey? Perhaps there's some secret sort of homing instinct in books that brings them to their perfect readers. How delightful if that were true."

That quote is from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. It's also how I feel about the book. I read it at a time when I hadn't found a really good book in a while.

If you're not going to read the rest of the post, then just read this part - you should definitely read this book.

It's written entirely in the form of correspondence - and it's just an incredibly sweet story. It's about the island called Guernsey in the English Channel and how they were essentially cut off from the rest of the world when they were occupied by the Germans. In order to avoid getting in trouble for being out after curfew one night, neighbors create the literary society...and that relatively random event causes their lives to be intertwined from that point forward.

One member of the literary society, Dawsey, comes across a book at a used book store that he enjoys - so he writes to the original owner of the book and asks her if she knows where he can get more of that author's work. The woman who he writes to is an author and after they correspond for a while, she wants to do a piece on Guernsey's "literary society" - so she goes to visit, and never wants to leave. It was only supposed to be a temporary visit, but even as she leaves behind a sophisticated life in London for the less cosmopolitan life in Guernsey, she finds a different kind of happiness.

The story is just really sweet. And the basic premise is that books can bring people together and make them happy. How could I not love it?

True Confections by Katharine Weber

I read this months ago. Literally. I'm sorry I stopped blogging for a while, but let's be real, did any of you really care? I didn't think so.

I'm gonna keep these short and sweet.

True Confections is a novel about a dysfunctional candy family. They're in the candy business - they're not made of candy. They're human. But the book probably would have been more interesting if they had been made of candy ("someone ate jimmy today").

So the whole thing is told in the form of a deposition - I liked that aspect of it. I'd never read a book written in that manner before. So that was pretty sweet (no pun intended). Basic story - candy family. Woman marries into candy family. Woman claims to be the only person who ever did any work in candy family. Woman thinks she deserves more. There's a big fire. People claim the woman started it and that it was arson. So she's defending herself.

I know I read a lot and I should have gotten over this by now, but there's almost nothing that pisses me off more than an unreliable narrator. You have to believe them. You're in a position of vulnerability - they're your only source of information. And they're going to lie to you? What's that about? Who would like that feeling?

Anyway. I don't really recommend that you read this book. I read it because it was recommended to me and there was candy involved. I just didn't enjoy it as much as I hoped to.