January
2001

LAMB IN LOVE
by Carrie Brown

Love comes late to Norris Lamb, the 55-year old protagonist of Carrie Brown's charming novel set in a tiny English village in 1969.  When Norris glimpses Vida Stephens dancing in the moonlight on the night of man's first landing on the moon, he is immediately smitten.  Shy and new to romance, he woos her anonymously...and unconventionally.

February
2001

PEARS ON A WILLOW TREE
by Leslie Pietrzyk

Leslie Pietrzyk has written a heartfelt novel about four generations of Polish-American women in twentieth-century America. From great-grandmother to great-granddaughter, each woman strives for independence but is bound to family and Old Country traditions. The bond of love is unbreakable among the Marchewka women... even through rebellions, secrets, and hard times.

March
2001

THE PACT
by Jodi Picoult

This is a riveting contemporary novel comprising a love story, a psychological study of two families, and a courtroom drama. The Golds and the Hartes have been best friends since before their children were born. Now teenagers, Emily and Chris are in love and their parents are delighted. When Emily commits suicide in Chris's company, the shock and grief are palpable to the reader. Flashbacks throughout the novel illuminate previously unseen problems while in the present, both families prepare for Chris' trial for murder.

April
2001

INTO THE FOREST
by Jean Hegland

Set in the near future, this insightful first novel explores the lives of two sisters struggling to survive the collapse of society. Convinced that normalcy will return, seventeen-year-old Nell reads the Encyclopedia Britannica in preparation for Harvard. Her sister Eva, an accomplished ballerina, dances to the beat of a home-made metronome. Adulthood arrives and the girls begin to re-create their relationship to each other and to the new world they now inhabit.

May
2001

AN ISOLATED INCIDENT
by Susan Sloan

Susan Sloan has written a gripping police procedural with intriguing characters and a keen appreciation for human nature.  A fifteen-year-old girl is brutally murdered on Seward Island, a tranquil community forty-five minutes from Seattle by ferry. The Islanders begin to suspect the new Jewish history teacher, but Chief Ruben Martinez and Detective Ginger Earley have to weigh circumstantial evidence against the now overt anti-Semitism of much of the populace.

GIRL WITH A PEARL EARRING
by Tracy Chevalier

This luminous blend of history and fiction is inspired by a painting by Vermeer. The "girl with a pearl earring" recounts her life as a maid in the artist's household in 1660's Holland. Hard-working and sweet-tempered, Griet proves to have a sensitive eye for color and composition and secretly begins to work as Vermeer's assistant. But when she poses for a painting wearing his wife's earring, jealousy erupts in the household and the scandal spreads to the world beyond.

IN THE TIME OF THE BUTTERFLIES
by Julia Alvarez

"Las Mariposas" or "The Butterflies" are revered in the Dominican Republic to this day. This is the moving story of three sisters who were ultimately slain by agents of the dictator, Trujillo. Skillfully blending fact and fiction, the author imagines their teenage years, their gradual involvement with the Revolution, and the terror they feel as their anti-government activities are uncovered. Domestic and political drama intertwine as the reader experiences history told in very human terms.

WAITING
by Ha Jin

Political upheaval in modern China is the backdrop for a gracefully told story of star-crossed lovers. Lin Kong is an army doctor trapped in an arranged marriage to an illiterate village girl. He falls in love with Manna, a nurse at his hospital, but his wife will not grant him a divorce. Lin will only be free to marry again when eighteen years have passed, but will the chaste love affair survive as the years tick on?

THE SAVING GRACES
by Patricia Gaffney

This is a feel-good novel tracing the lives of four women friends who meet regularly for dinner. Their conversation is the stuff of life... men, careers, babies, longings, and regrets. Their friendship survives and thrives though they irritate one another with their neuroses and penchant for amateur analysis. The voices and sentiments of each of them are distinct and appealing and the narrative gives each of them a chance to shine.