How 'Bout Them Reads: The Wife's Tale

Can you believe it? I've finally moved on from Sookie Stackhouse or books I've already read. But it was hard. I could have easily read the other two Hunger Games books, but I decided to be good and not...at least not yet. Which all this means that it was time to pick a new book. A book I've never read before from my bookshelf. It's a process that you might think an easy one, but if you have ever seen my bookshelf than you know that it is fair from easy. Sometimes it feels impossible in fact. So how do I often chose my next book if I don't already know? I ask my husband of course! Why? How do you choose your books?

via

So the hubs picked out The Wife's Tale by Lori Lansens. I know nothing about this author. I have never read this author before, although she has written a couple other books. When Borders was closing, all their books were on a super sale so I got to choose a lot of books that I probably wouldn't have chose otherwise. And this was one of them.

Mary Gooch and her husband are about to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary when her whole world is turned upside down. Mary has been battling her whole life with obsetity, which as a little kid she called obeast. It was always something that pushes her towards food. She was always hungry - always had to feed the obeast inside of her. Her constant weight gain was tough on Mary and her husband's relationship. It separated them a little more with each pound to the point where they were almost too distant to repair. They lived separate lives apart and together.

Mary decides to go out in search of her husband. She starts by going through receipts and discovering he was making frequent trips to Toronto and always the same restaurant. She decides to start there. Taking nothing with her but one extra pair of navy scrubs, she heads there first. It is there she discovers the reasoning behind his visits. He's meeting a woman, but it wasn't who she was expecting. It was his sister, who had fallen off the radar a long time ago. Gooch's sister, Heather, promises to call if she hears from Gooch and points her in the direction of Gooch's mother in California. So without even thinking, she boards a plane, the first time in her life, and heads to California.

She visits his mother and his ailing stepfather, but he's not there. She decides that she can't leave. If she leaves then she might miss him, so she plants herself in California. Making it her new home temporarily. But she feels a little lost. Losing her purse kept her busy with frequent trips to the local bank to get it all sorted out then she meets this mother of three who's husband just left her as well. They start bonding and form a friendship, where Mary frequent goes over and babysits the triplets while the mother works. And soon she finds herself bonding with Gooch's mother, who never really liked Mary. Gooch's stepfather is slowly dying away from the inside out, and it starts taking a toll on Gooch's mother, Edna. Mary starts volunteering to come over and help out, and when he goes to the hospital to die, Mary stays with her grieving mother-in-law.

While crossing the street one day, Mary witnesses a white van run over a Hispanic man. The man calls her an angel and insists she come with as they head for the hospital. The driver, the man that got hit and his friend all decide not to go to the hospital, so the driver takes him straight home. After Mary argues with the driver, he leaves her stranded far away from anywhere she knows. She heads for the house and is in for a rude-awakening of culture shock. She observes this large family and even finds herself thinking constantly about one man in particular, Jesus.

Before she realizes it, Mary finds herself away from home and excelling in her new life. The only problem was that not only was her constant hunger gone, but her hunger at all was gone. She was barely eating. It was Jesus that finally told her to start eating. That she just had to do it. She realized that she wasn't the woman she started out as. She was strong than she ever thought she was. She was independent and strong and capable for more than she had ever imagined.

--------------

I really didn't think I would like this book. When I started this book, I actually didn't like it at all. But it's not in my nature to not finish a book. It might be the worst book in the world, but if I started it then I'll finish it. And I was really happy I finished this book. I enjoyed it. I really liked Mary Gooch. She started out weak and defenseless and she was letting this happen to herself, but by the end of the book she was strong. She was standing on her own two feet. She was rebuilding. I started out not liking this book, but as it turned out I really liked this book.

18/52