July Book Club
Our July book club pick was One Italian Summer by Rebecca Serle.
Synopsis:
“When Katy’s mother dies, she is left reeling. Carol wasn’t just Katy’s mom, but her best friend and first phone call. She had all the answers and now, when Katy needs her the most, she is gone. To make matters worse, their planned mother-daughter trip of a lifetime looms: to Positano, the magical town where Carol spent the summer right before she met Katy’s father. Katy has been waiting years for Carol to take her, and now she is faced with embarking on the adventure alone.
But as soon as she steps foot on the Amalfi Coast, Katy begins to feel her mother’s spirit. Buoyed by the stunning waters, beautiful cliffsides, delightful residents, and, of course, delectable food, Katy feels herself coming back to life.
And then Carol appears—in the flesh, healthy, sun-tanned, and thirty years old. Katy doesn’t understand what is happening, or how—all she can focus on is that she has somehow, impossibly, gotten her mother back. Over the course of one Italian summer, Katy gets to know Carol, not as her mother, but as the young woman before her. She is not exactly who Katy imagined she might be, however, and soon Katy must reconcile the mother who knew everything with the young woman who does not yet have a clue.
Rebecca Serle’s next great love story is here, and this time it’s between a mother and a daughter. With her signature “heartbreaking, redemptive, and authentic” (Jamie Ford, New York Times bestselling author) prose, Serle has crafted a transcendent novel about how we move on after loss, and how the people we love never truly leave us.”
My thoughts:
Well, if I hadn’t have already wanted to go to Italy, I certainly do now! Plot aside, the storytelling was so vivid that it felt like I had been picked up and plopped right there in Positano. From the people Katy met to the food and wine she consumed to the scenery and landscape, I felt like I was right there with her. I truly hope I get to visit the Amalfi Coast someday.
The whole time Katy was on her trip, I was thinking about the story Where the Wild Things Are. I wondered if it was all a dream and Katy would wake up with a better understanding of both her mother and herself; and beside her, her dinner would still be warm on her bedside table. I guess we will never really know if it was a dream or time travel or what caused Katy to arrive in Positano in the 1990s.
Questions:
1) Why do you think Katy was so ambivalent to Eric after her mother died?
2) Before Katy discovered the photo, did you think Carol knew who Katy was? What are your thoughts about Carol abandoning her newborn to find herself?
3) Do you consider what happened between Adam and Katy cheating even though it happened in an alternate reality/time?
4) How do you think Katy ended up in the 1990s? Dream? Time Travel? Something else?
5) Did you think Katy’s meeting/befriending her 30 year old mother made her memory of Carol better or worse than it would have been had she not have taken this trip?
6) Rate it! 1-5 stars!
If you enjoyed this book, you may also like In Five Years and The Dinner List, also by Serle.
To spread the love of books, I will gift TWO copies of the book club pick each month. Just comment on any book post and/or on @sarahtakesabreather on Instagram so that I know you are following and interested! I’ll randomly choose the winners during the first few days of each month.
Check out our January discussion of The One Hundred Years of Lenni and Margot HERE!
And our February discussion of The Authenticity Project HERE!
Our March chat about Somebody’s Daughter HERE!
April’s discussion of The Flatshare HERE!
Our discussion in May of The Sky is Everywhere HERE!
Every Summer After in June HERE!