Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)The Oscar Wilde quote, "After a good dinner, one can forgive anybody, even one's own relations" that Patrica Gaffney prefaces her book with, is an accurate description of the issues she explores in Flight Lessons. In a twist to the biblical prodigal son, Anna returns to her hometown on the Chesapeake bay at the age of 36 and after a disasterous end to a romantic relationship. Anna is a complex, and often quite exasperating character. She is balanced in the book by her aunt Rose, now 60 and the owner of a faltering Italian restaurant. Anna is welcomed home and agrees to manage the restaurant for the summer but is not ready to forgive and forget the family issues that caused her to leave. Rose is a more appealing character, particularly in regard to her relationship with Theo, a crusty Bay waterman, now sidelined with a degenerative disease. All of the characters are finely drawn, Frankie, the talented but troubled new chef at the restaurant, Eddie, the handsome but unreliable bartender and Carmen,the unmarried, overweight long time chef who is resentful of the new chef and the changes Anna wants to make to save the restaurant.The close up look at running a small family restaurant was particularly interesting and the bits of information about birds and bird photography, the avocation of Mason, another character were engrossing. (I will now try to catch a bird yawnings, soemthing I never knew they did) More than a love story, the book is honest and insightful as it explore the complicated dynamics of family and the ways individuals address their own family history. Anna's apparent dysfunction and inabilty to sustain relationships seems as much due to her own unforgiving nature as the tough issues she dealt with as a child and young woman. Our desire to paint family members as either black or white, good or bad is illuminated as Anna addresses her memories of her mother and father as well as Rose. More than a good summer read, the book has enough interest to make your reading list in any season.
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