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11. Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, Rebecca Wells
10. Patient Zero, Jonathon Maberry
9. God's Country, Percival Everett
8. Heart of Stone, C. E. Murphy
7. The Secret Life of Houdini: The Making of America's First Superhero, William Kalush and Larry Sloman
6. The Good Fairies of New York, Martin Millar
5. Limeys: The True Story of One Man's War Against Ignorance, the Establishment and the Deadly Scurvy, David I. Harvie
4. The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd
3. Tatham Mound, Piers Anthony
2. Alas, Babylon, Pat Frank
1. Neverwhere, Neil Gaiman
Divine Secrets was actually better than I thought it was going to be. I saw the movie years ago--I know it was after June 2002, because that was the release date, so maybe I saw it late that year or in 2003. I remember at the time I liked it, but I don't remember much of it now.
I don't remember the feeling of sisterhood that's prevalent through the book. The Ya-Yas have been together since early childhood and they know everything about each other. They don't judge each other, and they don't abandon each other when times are hard. They love each other more than they love their husbands, at times.
Siddalee Walker is a successful stage director, and she lets a few details of her childhood slip to a reporter who then prints those nasty little details. Back in Thornton, Louisiana, Vivi gets incredibly upset and stays that way for a few months. Sidda tries to reconcile, tries to apologize, but it's hard for her--the way she sees it, she really did have an awful childhood. But then, she doesn't know the full story of Vivi's life. Vivi finally does send Sidda her "Divine Secrets" scrapbook, a book full of paper clippings and photos and clues to Vivi's life up to and including Sidda.
What's ironic is that though the novel is about exploring Vivi's life and fleshing her out, at the end, Sidda barely knows more than she started with. The book cuts back and forth between Sidda (holed away in a cabin in Washington), Vivi (still living the Ya-Ya fashion in Thornton, Louis.), and young Vivi in various stages of her life. But the flashbacks only illuminate the reader, not Siddalee.
The novel's about love in its various manifestations: between mothers and daughters, best friends, husbands and wives, goddaughters and godmothers, mothers' best friends and the girl they helped raise, lovers. Divine Secrets shows how they all weave together, how they all affect the others, how they make a wonderful, terrible net from which escape is pretty much impossible.
10. Patient Zero, Jonathon Maberry
9. God's Country, Percival Everett
8. Heart of Stone, C. E. Murphy
7. The Secret Life of Houdini: The Making of America's First Superhero, William Kalush and Larry Sloman
6. The Good Fairies of New York, Martin Millar
5. Limeys: The True Story of One Man's War Against Ignorance, the Establishment and the Deadly Scurvy, David I. Harvie
4. The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd
3. Tatham Mound, Piers Anthony
2. Alas, Babylon, Pat Frank
1. Neverwhere, Neil Gaiman
Divine Secrets was actually better than I thought it was going to be. I saw the movie years ago--I know it was after June 2002, because that was the release date, so maybe I saw it late that year or in 2003. I remember at the time I liked it, but I don't remember much of it now.
I don't remember the feeling of sisterhood that's prevalent through the book. The Ya-Yas have been together since early childhood and they know everything about each other. They don't judge each other, and they don't abandon each other when times are hard. They love each other more than they love their husbands, at times.
Siddalee Walker is a successful stage director, and she lets a few details of her childhood slip to a reporter who then prints those nasty little details. Back in Thornton, Louisiana, Vivi gets incredibly upset and stays that way for a few months. Sidda tries to reconcile, tries to apologize, but it's hard for her--the way she sees it, she really did have an awful childhood. But then, she doesn't know the full story of Vivi's life. Vivi finally does send Sidda her "Divine Secrets" scrapbook, a book full of paper clippings and photos and clues to Vivi's life up to and including Sidda.
What's ironic is that though the novel is about exploring Vivi's life and fleshing her out, at the end, Sidda barely knows more than she started with. The book cuts back and forth between Sidda (holed away in a cabin in Washington), Vivi (still living the Ya-Ya fashion in Thornton, Louis.), and young Vivi in various stages of her life. But the flashbacks only illuminate the reader, not Siddalee.
The novel's about love in its various manifestations: between mothers and daughters, best friends, husbands and wives, goddaughters and godmothers, mothers' best friends and the girl they helped raise, lovers. Divine Secrets shows how they all weave together, how they all affect the others, how they make a wonderful, terrible net from which escape is pretty much impossible.