If Eat, Pray, Love weren't a title already taken, that could have been the title of this book. There was lots of luscious eating in beautiful scenery in Italy, believable people trying to figure out where to go after being rejected by spouses, sailing, some drama, guilt and grace. Normandie has written another lovely story. If you like romance, you will like this story set in modern day New England and Italy.
For some reason, I wasn't even too ticked off by the romance trope of the rich, single guy willing to drop his life to follow a damsel in distress and shower her with gifts while being gentle and understanding at all times. Usually I hate that as I see it as much pornography for woman as the trope of a woman who wants sex with a man, right now! anywhere! and you don't even have to take a shower first! is pornography for a man. Wish fulfillment. Yeah, don't we all want a rich man who will take us on exotic trips and feed us chocolate and not care if we gain pounds and will not make demands on us? Well, this rich guy we could all feel sympathy for because he got rich by being in a accident that left him crippled and in pain. And he got dumped before the settlement came in. And Normandie made him seem like a real man with real issues.
Some people might be bothered by some of the spiritual or supernatural elements of the story. I hope not, because the prayers and experiences seemed the most real parts of the book to me. Having experienced some rare episodes of ESP or spiritual events and being the recipient of such (ie. my mother out hanging up clothes to dry suddenly knowing I was in danger ran into the house to find me in my crib turning blue with a rattle stuck in my throat), I firmly believe that while most such reports are delusional, some are real, and God sometimes lets us know things we can't know through our physical senses. I rather wish God would do that for us more often as I spend 99.99% of my time being totally clueless.
Thank you so much for that lovely review. I rather let myself go in this story and had fun with the supernatural. I've never actually seen images in waves, but I enjoyed pretending that Teo did! And how wonderful that your mother had that intuitive moment so we'd have you with us today, Lelia.
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