"Grace" by Elizabeth Nunez

Grace

by Elizabeth Nunez

Justin Peters is a Harvard-educated professor of British and classic literature who reads Shakespeare to his four-year-old daughter, Giselle. A native of Trinidad and the product of a strict, English-style education, Justin and his focus on the works of “Dead White Men” receive little professional respect at the public Brooklyn college where he teaches. But whatever troubles he might have at work are eclipsed when he realizes his wife, Sally, has begun to pull away from him, both physically and emotionally.

Harlem-born Sally Peters, a mother on the verge of turning forty, is a primary school teacher who believes that joy is a learned skill, and that it takes strength to be happy. After a life of tragic losses, Sally thought she had finally found that strength when she met Justin. 

But now, Sally wants something more. And Justin is angered by her uncertainty about their life and frightened by the thought that perhaps Sally never stopped loving the ex-boyfriend for whom she wrote fierce poems. Is he, Justin wonders, responsible for helping Sally find meaning in her life—a life that seems to him most fortunate? If Sally and Justin’s union is to survive, both must face the crippling echoes of their own pasts before those memories forever cloud and alter their future.

My Review: I have to admit that I finished the book several weeks ago before I went on a two week vacation. I should have made the time to write this before I left. This late in the game I don't really have any lasting impressions. Note to self: take notes as you read if you want to be a successful blogger! Self: thanks for the advice, consider it done! Overall, I found this a hard story to follow. I don't think that the character development was strong enough to pull me in. Not being in a relationship or having children made it that much more difficult to make a connection with the story. Justin seemed like an overbearing control freak. Just the reason I haven't been in a relationship in many years. Sally's character was so overshadowed that the author left me feeling like she was just a whiny brat who is too weak to define herself. 

I wish I had more to discuss. Grace just wasn't the love story for me even if Justin did share his library in the end. 

Recommendation: Although this wasn't a book that I got lost in I wouldn't go as far as to say that it's not for everyone. It's a different kind of love story. It's a story that I think you'll appreciate if you've been in a committed relationship and experienced emotional turmoil or ever felt like maybe you lost the real you somewhere along the way. Honestly, I have a hard time completely disliking any book, so there ya go. I also can't not finish a book, so there's another one. If I don't feel like I wasted my time then it was worth it. What have you got to lose? 

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