I’m clocking in with my May read just in the nick of time. Wish You Were Here by Jodi Picoult was an easy and engaging story. She wrote this book during the pandemic and it was the first fictional piece I’ve read that covers that timeframe. I suspect there will be many, many more to come but it felt surreal, in a way. This isn’t a book about the pandemic, per se, but is the story of a couple with goals and plans and life marching right on until everything came to a stop. One stayed behind for his job, while the other ended up stranded in the Galapagos. It’s beautiful written, the characters are the kind of people you’d want as friends, and the reader is transported directly into the heart of this couple’s covid story.
Diana O’Toole is perfectly on track. She will be married by thirty, done having kids by thirty-five, and move out to the New York City suburbs, all while climbing the professional ladder in the cutthroat art auction world. She’s an associate specialist at Sotheby’s now, but her boss has hinted at a promotion if she can close a deal with a high-profile client. She’s not engaged just yet, but she knows her boyfriend, Finn, a surgical resident, is about to propose on their romantic getaway to the Galápagos—days before her thirtieth birthday. Right on time.
But then a virus that felt worlds away has appeared in the city, and on the eve of their departure, Finn breaks the news: It’s all hands on deck at the hospital. He has to stay behind. You should still go, he assures her, since it would be a shame for all of their nonrefundable trip to go to waste. And so, reluctantly, she goes.
Almost immediately, Diana’s dream vacation goes awry. Her luggage is lost, the Wi-Fi is nearly nonexistent, and the hotel they’d booked is shut down due to the pandemic. In fact, the whole island is now under quarantine, and she is stranded until the borders reopen. Completely isolated, she must venture beyond her comfort zone. Slowly, she carves out a connection with a local family when a teenager with a secret opens up to Diana, despite her father’s suspicion of outsiders.
In the Galápagos Islands, where Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection was formed, Diana finds herself examining her relationships, her choices, and herself—and wondering if when she goes home, she too will have evolved into someone completely different.
12 Books in 12 Months
See the list here:
I put this one into my Little Free Library when I finished and it was gone by the afternoon! On the docket for June is Daisy Jones and The Six.
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