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Summary: Joan Medlicott is a wonderful author!
Review: The ladies are wonderful, warm, and human. I enjoyed meeting all of them, their family members and those who live in the community of Covington. Their lives to this point have been wonderful and sad. Their finding each other lead to finding themselves. I enjoyed this book and look forward to more from Joan Medlicott in the future. Her story inspired me and taught me to look forward to the future as an older woman. This book reminded me of Jan Karon's books and all the wonderful folks in Mitford.
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Summary: A tender story of lives reclaimed
Review: The ladies of Covington are three women who have found themselves in the same boarding and are facing living out their lives there. Through a twist and and an unknown family member, one woman comes into possession of an old housein the small town of Covington, KY. Each woman takes a step away from the past to strike out and move into this old house and reclaim their lives. Family relationships are tested, mended and revealed. Each woman has the opportunity to discover some deeper truth within herself. The writing is delightful and descriptive, and the portraits of each woman are tender and well thought out. The supporting people are also a good mix of personalities. Yhis was a very soothing and affirming book to read
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Summary: The hardest book review I've ever written
Review: The three ladies in this story share a dislike of a controlling landlady, so when one inherits a property in Covington, they pool their resources, renovate the property and move in to build a new life. Each lady has a distinct personality and set of worrying problems to work through with or without the help of the others.On one level, that of entertainment, the book rates higher than 3 stars. But I lost interest in it about halfway through -- I did read the whole thing -- because it was too predictable and the characters lost credibility. It's a rare book today where women don't express their independence by going along with society's contemporary views of morality. These women do exactly that -- and much too easily for women of their time and place. I wondered if this is really the way Medlicott wrote the book or if a lot of it wasn't changed by suggestions from a younger editor. I can just see the argument: "Modern readers won't accept..." Don't get me wrong, now, the characters do struggle, but with the wrong problems. They agonize over trivialities. I'm of this generation of women as are most of my friends, and we're Southerners, too. This just doesn't ring true. Joan Medlicott and Jan Karon must be America's answer to Rosamunde Pilcher and Maeve Binchy. However, Pilcher's books are spectacular in their warmth and sensitivity. They celebrate independent women who unashamedly value home life and family. She seems to have found the balance that eludes the others.
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Summary: A bit dull..
Review: This book was ok but you can guess what is going to happen and that forever is a turn off of reading for me. I don't agree with the views in this book but read on because I longed to sit on that darn porch!
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Summary: This was SO good!
Review: This is the touching story of three women who meet in a Pennsylvania boarding establishment for women of "a certain age" run by a meddlesome landlady, Olive Pruitt. There they were guaranteed three meals a day and were expected to sit out their lives with nothing to look forward to except daily boredom and a sagging bed. These women, Grace Singleton, Amelia Declose, and Hannah Parrish come from very different backgrounds. However, they soon become fast friends and make the brave decision to take off together on a little trip. Needless to say, their grown children are not happy with this sudden spurt of independence, but each of these women soon learn that they have skills, talents, and a depth of spirit that they never believed was possible. Later, what started out as a bit of adventure became a turning point for each of them. They made the decision to put the boarding house behind them and begin new lives together in a sadly rundown farmhouse near Asheville, North Carolina. The reader follows these ladies as they build on each other's talents and transform the farmhouse into the house of their dreams. It was here that these three women reclaimed their productive lives and wove themselves into a new community. I found myself overjoyed at each of their successes and profoundly sad at their difficulties. This book was a joy to read and I became totally absorbed in the daily lives of these three women as they found self-acceptance and the courage to do the unexpected. In so doing, they found that it was their love and friendship for each other that was the most important ingredient in their lives. ***** This book was SO good! I fully intend to locate other books by this amazing author. It touched me on several different levels and left me begging for more! *****
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Summary: Enjoyed the ladies
Review: We always tend to think that after a certain age, you have stopped living. Not so in this book. Here you have a group of ladies who after living in a dismal "old ladies" boarding house, that they CAN start over and improve their lot. I am looking forward to the sequel. Only thing I didn't like about this book is that one of the ladies kept going off and getting lost.(She did it twice)Other than that, I enjoyed reading that.
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Summary: THE LADIES SEND MORE THAN THEIR LOVE
Review: We'll be like 'The Three Musketeers," suggested Hannah. And they were. However, the trio in Joan Medlicott's heartwarming debut novel face adversaries unknown to Dumas's heroes. These women, widowed and well past 60, confront fear, estrangement, and loneliness, all exacerbated by the physical discomforts of advancing age. "The Ladies Of Covington Send Their Love" is woven of tragedy and joy, as well as the everyday occurrences that define life. While thoughtful editing would have trimmed repetition, Ms. Medlicott is attuned to the nuances of Southern life, and draws her characters with affectionate understanding, especially a ninety-year-old backwoods farmer known simply as "Old Man." With landscape artist's eye she paints vivid word pictures of changing seasons. Amelia, Grace and Hannah become friends at a Pennsylvania residential home run by cantankerous Olive who dispenses fresh salad begrudgingly and caustic barbs in abundance. Fragile, private Amelia appears permanently shattered by the loss of her husband and daughter. When she is bequeathed a Covington, North Carolina farm by a distant relative, the women seek respite from their routine lives with a small adventure - they will visit the inherited property. The trio's journey is spearheaded by tall, broad shouldered, outspoken Hannah, a former garden nursery owner. As a desperate young mother she had taken her two daughters and fled an alcoholic, abusive husband. Quiet, diffident, unworldly Grace is at first reluctant to go, as she still clings to her late husband's belief that the world is a dangerous place. But, she acquiesces just as she always has - first to the dictates of an inflexible father, then to the wishes of her husband, and finally to the desires of their only child.. So, with Grace at the wheel, floorboarding an elderly station wagon to 35 mph, the ladies motor South. Upon arrival, Amelia is dismayed to find a rundown farmhouse with "sagging windows, a listing porch, tilting steps, and grimy clapboard" surrounded by rampant overgrowth. Nonetheless, each is so eager for somewhere to belong that they decide to renovate, then pool their resources and share a home.. Ignoring the admonitions of their grown children, whom they feel look at them from a child's perspective, not imagining "that we might still have hopes or dreams or longings," they forge ahead. Why couldn't they do it? After all, as one notes, they have 207 years of experience between them. Two centuries of combined experience had scarcely prepared them for flooding, a raging orchard fire, a loved one with AIDS, the possible loss of their land, or unexpected romance. Yet, they meet each of these challenges with equanimity and heart, placing their trust in one another as their friendship strengthens and grows. Fear, they have learned, is one of their worst enemies, "Fear's a box we grow used to, convince ourselves it's all the space we need, that we like its color, its smell, its protection," Hannah explains. "Comes a time to stop hiding, stop being afraid. If we don't break free of our boxes, our spirits' shrink...." The spirits of Amelia, Grace and Hannah did not shrink; they soared. In the end, the ladies of Covington send more than their love - they send an inspiring message of self-acceptance, courage, and survival.
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Summary: The Ladies of Covington Send Their Love
Review: When I started reading this book, I did not realize what a treat I was getting into. It is about three elderly women living in an ugly boarding house, sort of waiting until their time is up but not interacting very much. But suddenly one of them is left a run down house and some money down south. They decide to go down to see it and decide to use that money to fix up the house and literally start new and more useful and energetic lives.... they literally come alive again. It was most heartening and not boring at all. I cannot wait for the author to write another book since this one was her first. I recommend to all women especially those of us in "the best years of our lives".
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Summary: The Ladies Send Their Love
Review: Whether they are ladies from Covington or anywhere else, they ARE ladies, ones I would like to know. Joan Medlicott has woven a wonderfully warm and rich story about Grace, Amelia and Hannah, who though in their sixties, prove they have the capacity to grow and beome more than what they were. Aside from the story of growth, bonding, compromise and fulfilment, Joan has so succinctly woven in her own philosophies of life---and death, some of which really resonated with me: "In time, unless we go first, we all lose someone we cherish. If that happens, you'll do what every man or woman does who loses a loved one, from whateever cause. You'll hurt, you'll be angry, you'll cry, you'll be bitterly lonely. There'll be times when it seems there's no light at the end of the tunnel, but you'll go on. Eventually, you'll take up your life again." How meaningful, how true. The book beautifully depicts the strength of women as wives, as mothers, as friends and as members of the community. Let's hear more from the Ladies of Covington, Joan.
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Summary: If you love maeve binchy
Review: you will love this book. written by a new author, it is a compelling and warm story about three women in their mid 60's + who believe they have lost life and are resigned to an assisted living home with a Dicken type life controller. Any baby boomer who is looking ahead will feel lots of hope and a renewed interest in life. Highly recommended.
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