reading Archives - Jane Heller

When my friend Laurie recommended Amor Towles’s novel, I’d said, “Yeah, yeah. I heard it was good and I’ll get around to it.” I don’t know why I didn’t jump into the book right after she’d touted it so highly. The reviews had been exceptional but I was busy scoping out “Fifty Shades of Grey” to see what the fuss was about. (I shouldn’t have bothered. What a bore.)

Finally, I downloaded “Rules” on my Kindle and started reading. The beginning was slow. I wasn’t sure I’d like the book after all. And then boom – the prologue was over and the author plunged me right into the heart of the story of a smart, pretty, wise-beyond-her-years women named Katey Kontent in 1938 New York City. I became enthralled with her life, with her best friend Evey, with the man they both befriended, Tinker Grey, and all the characters who came after.

The book is such a compelling read. New York back then was a place of glamor and jazz and beautiful clothes, as well as of Depression era poverty and war. Katey, who narrates the story, has such a strong voice that I was utterly drawn in by her changes in fortune. When she loved, I loved. When she hurt, I hurt. I was rooting for her in a way I haven’t felt about a heroine in a very long time.

And to think she was created by a male author. Amazing. Towles’s writing is so beautiful at times it makes you ache with longing. Obviously, I didn’t want the book to end and kept hoping that it would magically go on forever.

But alas, I finished it this morning and I’m in mourning. I didn’t like the ending – not because it didn’t feel right or appropriate but because I’m a romantic sap and I wanted….Well, never mind. No spoilers here.

Since there’s a huge void in my reading life at the moment, I’m in the market for a new book. But it won’t be easy to find one that transports me the way “Rules” did. Sigh.

This is sort of a sad post. Just warning you. Well, not sad exactly. Just bittersweet.

Over the years, lots of readers have written to me telling me how much they’ve enjoyed my books. They’ve been mostly women, and they’ve had straightforward names like Linda and Cindy as well as lighthearted email handles like cupcake4you and queenoflaughter. Many asked if I would send out an e-newsletter to keep them informed of my writing projects. As a result, I kept a list of their email addresses on the off-chance that I might actually produce a “Hi, here’s what’s new” notification at some point.

Now that this Mainly Jane blog is up and running and the web site has been all dressed up, I thought, Why not send everybody that “Hi, here’s what’s new” email after all.

At first I worried that the sheer volume of the outgoing mail would cause my server to shut me down for conducting a spam operation. But then came the bounce-backs. You know the ones. They say “Undeliverable.” And “Returned Mail.” And – this is the cruelest cut of all – “Failure.”

Not every email came back, but quite a few of them did, and the whole exercise reminded me that people’s lives change. I mean, really change. They graduate from college, move to another house or another part of the country, get married and/or divorced, lose their jobs and/or find new ones. And some die.

Whatever happened to that nice woman named Donna who used to write to me so often? And how about Samantha, who had broken her leg and asked her mother to set her up in bed with a bunch of my books? And what about Ronni, who liked to confide in me, a perfect stranger, about her troubles and tell me how my stories cheered her up? Where did they all go while I was so busy leading my own life?

I’ll never know. But I began the task tonight of deleting the no-longer-viable names and addresses from the Word document that’s been sitting in my computer for the longest time. Wherever they are, I hope my old friends have a book in their hands (or on their Kindle). That’s one thing I do know about them: they love to read.

Now Playing On My Kindle: "The Rules of Civility"

Weeding Out And Saying Goodbye

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