Title: Joy for Beginners
Author: Erica Bauermeister
Publisher: Putnam Adult
Publication Date: June 9, 2011
Hardcover: 288 Pages
ISBN: 978-0062004376
Genre: Fiction
At an intimate, festive dinner party in Seattle, six women gather to celebrate their friend Kate’s recovery from cancer. Wineglass in hand, Kate strikes a bargain with them. To celebrate her new lease on life, she’ll do the one thing that’s always terrified her: white-water rafting. But if she goes, all of them will also do something they always swore they’d never do-and Kate is going to choose their adventures.
Shimmering with warmth, wit, and insight, Joy for Beginners is a celebration of life: unexpected, lyrical, and deeply satisfying.
My Review:
Joy for Beginners by Erica Bauermeister is a unique look at friendships and love through the tales of seven women. After Kate’s successful battle against breast cancer, her friends gather to help her celebrate but soon learn that Kate desires each of them to face a difficult challenge, much as she did. In this way, Bauermeister sets the scene to explore each friend’s inner strengths and weaknesses. Though the manner in which Bauermeister delves into each life through separate chapters was not particularly clever, she has expertly crafted a novel with strong female characters in an inspiring story of triumph through strength and the mutual support of friends. Through beautifully descriptive prose, Bauermeister introduces readers to the women and the settings for each chapter, providing readers with a sense of “being there” alongside the characters. In short, I found Joy for Beginners to be a delightful and heartwarming read and would recommend it to book discussion groups.
Erica Bauermeister is the author of the national bestseller The School of Essential Ingredients. She lives in Seattle with her family.
To learn more about author Erica Bauermeister please visit her website.
For more reviews of the book, please follow the book tour.
I received an arc of Joy for Beginners by Erica Bauermeister from TLC Book Tours to be a part of this tour and offer my honest review of the book. Receiving a complimentary copy in no way reflected my review of aforementioned book.
I can imagine that this would be a lot of fun to read with a group of women! I’m glad you enjoyed it – thanks for being on the tour.
It would be brilliant for a book discussion group.