Vinnie Milner is looking forward to her research trip to England. At 50 she is a professor at a prestigious university on the East Coast and a leading authority on children’s nursery rhymes, a rather esoteric subject not highly regarded by her colleagues. In spite of their disregard however, Vinnie has nonetheless achieved some small success in her career, with solid, well researched publications as well as the satisfaction of teaching and mentoring her students. That is until her most recent publication received a scathing review from a well known critic putting all her success in jeopardy.  Luckily, the review was in a journal that is only published in the United States, and Vinnie hopes it will not be noticed in England and any notoriety it might generate in her academic circles will have died down by the time she returns.

With that hope in mind she boards her plane, hoping to have a quiet and restful flight, when a large man wearing a Western-cut suit, and a raw hide tie sits next to her and begins to talk.  He is a sanitary engineer from Tulsa, Oklahoma on a group tour to England. He is a type that she would ordinarily despise but soon she finds herself helping him do some genealogical research and feels an attraction that is very unexpected.

Fred Turner, a colleague of Vinnie’s, is also going to England for research. He is reeling from the break-up of his marriage and feels lost and unmoored.  He is hoping that the time away in the calm of libraries and books might help him understand what has happened to his marriage and his life, but his plans for a calm, contemplative trip are dashed as soon as he meets the most beautiful actress in England at a party he attends as Vinnie’s guest. He is immediately under her spell and she introduces him to a glamorous upper class London social scene that he never imagined existed. Soon he has abandoned the stuffy library for the eclectic social swirl that her highborn status grants her entrée. But Fred grows increasingly concerned about his lover’s volatility and her seeming inability to understand that not everyone can live as she does.

Lurie traces the course of these two relationships with a deftness and tenderness that is truly remarkable. With gentle grace, but startling honesty Lurie teases out and lays bear the hidden fears and excuses that can keep us from finding and acknowledging the love we need most. Winner of the 1984 Pulitzer, this is a book that still resonates today.

Brenda’s Rating: ***** (5 out of 5 Stars)

Recommend this book to: Keith, Sharon, Marian and Lauren

Book Study Worthy? Yes!

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