USA TODAY International Edition
Moyes celebrates power of reading
The thwack of a book striking a man’s head, the crack of a gunshot and an escape on horseback signal the stellar start to Jojo Moyes’ new book, “The Giver of Stars” ( Pamela Dorma Books/ Viking, 400 pp.,
Rather than the story of a single romance, as in her best- selling 2012 hit “Me Before You,” “Giver” is a love story of an unlikely group of women who defy society’s norms to deliver library books to people in the mountains of Kentucky during the Great Depression, a real- life program launched by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Margery O’Hare is the fearless leader of the Horseback Librarians of Kentucky. She reaches out for more women willing to saddle up horses to serve people whose circumstances won’t allow them to make it to town for books. First to volunteer is Alice Van Cleve, the newlywed British wife of Bennett Van Cleve, whose father owns the local mining company. Alice fled a dull life in Britain into handsome Bennett’s arms. But life with Bennett proves even duller; he shows little interest in his wife, either in or outside the marital bed.
Alice flings herself into delivering books as a way to avoid home and her deeply disapproving father- in- law. Moyes’ descriptions of the women’s travels to impoverished families are affectionate and so vivid, you can practically smell the smoke curling from chimneys.
Margery is a moonshiner’s daughter, the child of an abusive home and a woman of few words but great warmth toward the people of the hollows – and the local mine’s fire chief, Sven Gustavsson.
Moyes’ new book illustrates why she is a two- time winner of Romance Novel
of the Year Award from the Romance Novelists’ Association. The yearning devotion Sven has for marriage- averse Margery despite her attempts to keep him at bay, and the slow- burning passion between Alice and the man who owns the library building, are heartrending and real.
The librarians risk community outrage as early proponents of sex education by delivering a book to women who ask about marital intimacy. Yet Moyes is coy about two characters who could be gay; maybe that’s a topic for another novel.
Margery also defies the elder Van Cleve by spreading word of how his mine expansion threatens nearby houses.
Domestic violence is seen as a man’s right in this era. When one of the librarians is brutally beaten, Margery says the worst thing about being hit by a man is “that it don’t matter how smart you are, how much better at arguing, how much better than them, period. It’s when you realize they can always shut you up with a fist.” Until, she says, you learn to fight back.
“The Giver of Stars” is a richly rewarding exploration of the depths of friendship, good men willing to stand up to bad and adult love. Moyes celebrates the power of reading in a terrific book that only reinforces that message.