HEADING OUT TO WONDERFUL by Robert Goolrick, 2012.
Brownsburg, Virginia, in 1948 is a quiet and peaceful village nestled in the beautiful Valley of Virginia. Everyone knows everyone else and everyone knows their place in life. The world is slow paced here, meant to be enjoyed calmly and serenely.
   One day a stranger arrives, carrying with him two suitcases and not much else. One suitcase has personal items and a lot of money in it; the other contains a set of butcher knives. As the townspeople soon discover, the handsome and friendly man is Charlie Beale, and he wants to settle in their peaceful community. He becomes enamoured of some acreage along the river and wants it for himself, as well as employment, which he finds with the local butcher, Will Haislett. The Haisletts, Will and his schoolteacher wife Alma and their six-year-old son Sam, become a huge part of Charlie's life in the village.
   Charlie, a personable and charming character, adjusts to life in the community and learns his way around, helped along by the Haisletts. He enjoys the companionship of Sam, who becomes like a son to him, and Sam finds a kindred spirit in Charlie--they share a love of baseball, dogs, and being outdoors. Along with the dog Charlie purchases and names Jackie Robinson (for the baseball player), they become a familiar sight around town. However, their easy relationship changes from the time Charlie first sees the teenaged Sylvan Glass, wife of the richest resident of Brownsburg--he is certain that the two of them are meant to be together. Blonde and lovely and from a remote area of the county, Sylvan had been bought and paid for by Boatwright Glass, to be his wife and to live the sort of Hollywood/movie star life she's always dreamed about. But once Charlie enters her orbit, events are set into motion that will change the lives of those who dwell in Brownsburg and ultimately lead to a shockingly heartbreaking tragedy.
   Goolrick knows how to tell a story. With his nicely paced narrative, he pulls the reader into a deceptively simpler time that is no more and adroitly makes his characters come to life. His descriptions of Brownsburg and the surrounding landscape are wonderful and add so much to the telling of the story: details of cars, fashions, movies, buildings, the way the farmlands look, the old trees and the river, names of real places in the county, all meld together to create a meaningful atmosphere, a real sense of time and place. His characters are multifaceted and so human, easy to relate to and have feelings for, to be concerned about. I kept reading because I wanted to know what would happen to these people, I had to find out how their stories and conflicts would turn out. His principal characters are well done and believable as people: Charlie, with his desire to belong and his obsession with Sylvan; Sylvan's passion to live her life as something out of a movie; Boaty's greed and jealousy and vulgarity; Claudie Wiley (who deserves a book of her own), the solitary black seamstress who could almost magically sew anything and keep herself aloof; and young Sam, who practically hero-worships Charlie, who becomes a part of Charlie's and Sylvan's illicit affair and who ends up experiencing situations that no kid should.
   Emotional and satisfying, at times painful, part Gothic romance and part nostalgia, with unflinching language and beautiful description and involving characters, it's a tale that has it all: Power, money, grand ideas, golden dreams, lust, doomed love, suspense, growing up, acceptance, baseball. Personally, I found this novel a thought-provoking and moving story about life and relationships in a small town, and a very worthwhile read.
  

THE SERVANTS' QUARTERS by Lynn Freed, 2009.
A slight story, set in South Africa after World War II. Interesting and strange little story that concerns a young Jewish girl living with her mother, sister and comatose father down the hill from the Harding mansion. Cressida and her family are invited to live in the mansion's servants' quarters when they have to leave their home, and George Harding, a former RAF pilot who was injured and disfigured during the war, takes an interest in the intelligent and precocious girl. Eventually, she is hired by Harding to serve as a companion to his elderly mother and for his nephew and he appoints himself her mentor; however, his interest in her changes over the ensuing years. And as Cressida matures, her interest in Mr. Harding develops as well. Issues of class, status, and race add a sense of time and place to the story, and the author uses elements of Jane Eyre and Beauty and the Beast to good effect throughout. Well written and a pleasant read.

THE GUERNSEY LITERARY AND POTATO PEEL PIE SOCIETY by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows, 2008.

I had been meaning to read this, but had just put it off. Don't know why, just got buried under other books I wanted to read more. It's an excellently crafted story done in letters, between a British woman writer and a group of people on the Island of Guernsey, concerning their lives during the German Occupation of the island during World War II. As the story is set in 1946, the memories are fresh, and thus there's more of an impact. Author Juliet Ashton is contacted by a man, Dawsey Adams, who owns one of her discarded books, and the correspondence takes off from there: she, looking for another subject for a book, becomes intrigued by some of his references to the Literary Society and wants to know more. Dawsey recommends she correspond with others on the island. So she exchanges letters with others in the society and over time the story is fleshed out through these letters. Juliet is drawn into their varied lives comes to know them intimately--their likes, dislikes, what they read, how they feel, etc., and eventually she decides to visit Guernsey to meet them all in person. Her visit becomes a time of self discovery for Juliet, as she meets the folks she has come to know only through their letters. There is kind Amelia Maugery, fisherman Eben Ramsey and his grandson Eli, Isola Pribby (who makes potions), the pretender John Booker, Will Thisby, who concocts potato peel pie for the group, and young Kit McKenna, an orphan; all of whom have their own stories, plus pieces of the main story. Central to the novel is the story of Elizabeth McKenna, a friend to many on Guernsey, who is taken away by the Germans to Ravensbruck, and who hasn't returned yet. Part of Juliet's discoveries on the island concern Elizabeth and her whereabouts and what they learn about Elizabeth's fate changes all of these characters' lives forever. A very moving and fascinating book, well drawn characters good and bad, interesting story and setting, lots of genuine warmth and humor, and about finding connections. A very worthwhile read.

Last night I finished reading:

THE BIBLE SALESMAN by Clyde Edgerton, 2008.

Edgerton is one of my favorite Southern writers. From the time I read RANEY, I have enjoyed his sense of humor and his writing style. This particular novel concerns a car thief, Preston Clearwater, who picks up a young Bible salesman, Henry Dampier, and makes the innocent faced, somewhat naive kid his partner in crime. Set mainly in the post-World War II South, Edgerton includes plenty of down-home language and customs and foods and plot twists and odd characters (the old lady who throws her voice so that her cats talk is hilarious) to keep the reader interested. I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys good Southern storytelling.