Rating: 
Summary: Ordinary stories with extraordinary characters
Review: The thing I love about Berg is that she says what women think, understands where women are coming from, and know what women want. And she writes about it! "Ordinary Life" is a book of 13 short stories. Each one taking us on a journey....places we know, emotions we have experienced, thoughts we have thought, situations we are living in. "Ordinary life-A Love Story"... my favorite, by the way, is about Mavis, a 79 year old woman who has locked herself in the bathroom and will not come out... "You might as well go to Big Boy for supper" she tells her husband through the crack of the door. She reflects. The first time she made love with her husband, how many pets have they had, the smell of their babies skin, what the wall paper looked like 20 years ago, her friendship with her sister. How the simple things in life, the ordinary things, were truly more important and joyous than most anything. Oh, to lock myself in the bathroom for one whole week....what luxury!!!! I cryed when I read "Caretaking" A daughter reversing roles with her mother as the caregiver. The daughter remembering her mother comforting her... whispering...
"Don't you know I will always take care of you?" And of course....."Martin's Letters to Nan" Nan acually takes off, leaves everything, travels around the country to find her identity once again.
She is my hero!!! What mom and wife would acually have the nerve to do just that??!! Have we thought of it?
YES. Martin's letters to her are superb, hilarious, moving...
I read this outloud to my husband.... ---Let me be the one to say this first. You say, oh Martin, look at that painting! Look at it! Oh Martin, listen to the violin, Listen to it! It's like your a culture Nazi. I see it, Nan, I hear it, I taste it, I ... smell it, I just do not need to TALK TALK TALK TALK TALK about it! My husband laughed....That's you, he said! Berg's gift is capturing the ordinary and making it extraordinary... The simple things,
hot sun on skin, the smell of soap on fingers, the sound of a mother's voice, even the pattern of wall paper. This is about me! This is how I feel! My husband is that way! These are sentences you may utter as you read "Ordinary Life" Berg is just like us... She is our girlfriend....
Let's do lunch soon, Liz!
Rating: 
Summary: An outstanding book!
Review: This is an outstanding book of short stories that is one of the best books I've read in the last 20 years! Ms. Berg is an exceptional writer who truly has a handle on human emotions and the common problems of everyday life. I truly wished that each of her stories could be turned into separate novels....they are that good!
Rating:
Summary: seen myself in it
Review: This was a book full of short stories that I will remember months,no...years from now. Every story I was torn between whether to read it slower, to enjoy it, or faster to find out what happens. There was not one story in the book that didn't touch me in some way. I seen myself in every single story. Elizabeth Berg has a way of putting to words things I've only ever thought. Wonderful collection of stories.
Rating:
Summary: Great reading without the commitment....
Review: What a fun time I had reading this book. I actually pulled my husband in and read a story to him and he loved it. If you have enjoyed Elizabeth Berg in the past don't pass this one up! It is everything you love about her strectched into many characters, stories and settings. I actually picked this up and dove in so fast I didn't realize it was short stories, thus I moved into the second chapter and was a little confused until I flipped back and read the cover. Oops! But I loved the fact that I could read one or more stories when I had time, then put it away for a bit. I read it on vacation and that was perfect, because there was no remembering what happens from chapter to chapter. Elizabeth Berg delivers in her true to women style with honesty and tenderness. You will end up relating with someone definitely in this book because there is so much to see and read, but yet the underlying truth of human frailities lingers with each story you read. Great for a book club to discuss and dissect! If you have read "Pull of the Moon" by Berg then you will especially appreciate one story in here, a husbands response to a wife and her need for a sabatical from there marriage. I applaud Berg for her storytelling talent and real life pain and joy she flawlessly delivers time and time again. If you like to be touched a bit, observe the joy in life and even sometimes be a bit cynical, then this book will be just your style.
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