In a week full of serious, heavy, devastating news, I was grateful to see not one but two emails from North Shore Reading Roundup readers. Two of them! Reading has always been a reliable escape from what ails you, and hearing from book lovers who keep this column alive felt like its own kind of medicine.
Barb Kinny of Knife River wrote in after returning from wintering in the south and said the North Shore will always be her “happy place.”
Kinny and I share a favorite author in Jodi Picoult, and she recently read one I haven’t gotten to yet. Picoult’s 2021 novel Wish You Were Here intertwines a COVID‑era storyline with a travelogue of the Galápagos. Since the islands are on Kinny’s bucket list, she picked this one up. Unfortunately, it didn’t become a new favorite.
“I’m not sure if it was all the COVID memories rushing back of the isolation, fear, and uncertainty, but this wasn’t a favorite story,” Kinny wrote. “Although Ms. Picoult will always be one of my favorite storytellers, this book got a 3 out of 5-star review from me.”
Hopefully, the book Kinny is moving on to, The Correspondent (a 2025 novel by Virginia Evans), for an upcoming book club selection will earn a better rating. She also noted she enjoyed The Berry Pickers, which we featured in our last North Shore Reading Roundup. (She definitely has good taste.)
Another reader with good taste is NSJ’s very own and my friend, Steve Fernlund, who sent over his “book recs” after letting me know how much he enjoys this column. (See? Told you he has good taste.)
Books have always been a big part of Fernlund’s life.
“In earlier days, I loved hanging out in bookstores,” he wrote. “Of course, back then, you could walk out of the store with four or five books and change from your $20 bill.”
He accumulated quite a collection over the years, moving it from Bloomington to Grand Marais to Las Vegas to Rancho Cucamonga. It was in that last place, he advised, where he donated more than a dozen banker boxes of books to the local library.
Though he once swore he’d always read physical books, these days he has come to appreciate his Kindle and Libby, a library‑based app that allows you to borrow books, audiobooks, and other media. Fernlund reads a few ebooks a week but still buys the occasional used paperback or hardcover.
“They’re like comfortable sweatpants,” he says of those wellworn, well-read, pre-loved books.
He tends to donate books when he’s through with them, aside from the “special ones” he keeps stacked on his bookshelf. I, too, have a “special ones” shelf. These are books I might lend out with no due date required, but with the caveat that one day I’d want them back on that shelf again. Otherwise, down the road they go, though the path they take varies depending on who I think might enjoy them most.
It didn’t surprise me that Fernlund recommended John Steinbeck. He’s a reflective writer in his own right, inward-looking, observant, and thoughtful, so Steinbeck fits. He mentioned two favorites. The Grapes of Wrath, set during the Dust Bowl years of the 1930s, focuses on man’s inhumanity to others. Like many of us, Fernlund first read it in high school, but he said he got far more out of it when he reread it a few years ago. He’s got me considering finding a copy for a reread, myself.
He also recommended East of Eden, a Cain‑and‑Abel story he calls “food for thought about life, death, and family.” I admit I haven’t read this one, though it’s on my shelf. I’ve seen the movie. There was a time in my life when I was into all things James Dean. It’s a heartbreaking film. I can only imagine the novel is another level of heart‑wrenching.
Fernlund and I likely share another author on that “special ones” shelf. Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude is one of his favorites, “especially for those of us moved by the power of words and imagery.” I also have this one on my to‑read shelf, but the Márquez that holds a special place in my personal library is Love in the Time of Cholera. I’ve read it twice, and though the movie took liberties, I enjoyed that as well.
As for my recent reading adventures, I finished The Mother’s Promise by Sally Hepworth, which I mentioned in our last issue. I read it quickly, fell for the characters, and thought the writing was good. It was a little predictable, and if I’m being honest, I’m not great at predicting stories, so maybe it was more than a little predictable. I’ve handed it over to my mom. We’ll see what she thinks.
As I was about to scan my shelves to choose what’s next, a book arrived in the mail for review, so East of Eden and One Hundred Years of Solitude will have to wait. That’s fine, they’re weighty reads that’ll be worth the wait. Seriously, those babies are thick. But I believe my friend when he says they’re worth the read.
Many of these titles are available at your local bookstores and libraries. Check out Drury Lane Books, Back Forty Books, Libby, or even the Little Libraries around town. Treasures are found when we share our stories, our books, and our love of reading.
Thank you to Barb Kinny and Steve Fernlund for helping keep this column alive. North Shore readers, share what you’re reading or what you’ve read, what you loved, what you hated, what you couldn’t get through no matter how you tried. I’d love to know, and from the feedback I’ve heard on the streets, so would others. Write to sarahwritesnsj@yahoo.com to be included in a future edition of North Shore Reading Roundup. You can remain anonymous if you’d like. Happy Reading!
