![]() I loved the talented Trompette and the mysterious Arthur. All the while Anastasia is the anchor, the pivot point around whom they all flow and eddy.This just might become one of my favorite reads of 2021 as it invoked calm into the happenstances Eve and Sally are challenged by. This was the start of a journey measured in days not hours, a journey of the soul.And that's what drew me on! The people, the rhythms, the slow winding down and calming that takes place as the women undergo their own particular canal change (sea change!)This read was whimsical, deep, and slow moving like the canals, and I flowed along with it as the women learned more about themselves, as they interacted with each other, (they are total opposites) and with the very different people they encounter. Sally had just walked out on her marriage and Eve had been let go from her job as an engineer.Walking from different directions along the tow path the women happen to intersect with each other and Anastasia, a hardened canal boat owner who’s worked the canals and locks for years.Eve and Sally find themselves deciding to help Anastasia out of a problem, crewing on her narrowboat The Number One, learning the locks and the rhythms of the river, before taking it to a boatyard at Chester whilst Anastasia took care of some health needs. Three women meet on a tow path just out of London and for two their lives change forever.A fabulous cast of eccentric characters and two middle aged women. Meanderings to relish!I so enjoyed Narrowboat Summer. The story is reminiscent of the Mason Missouri books by Elizabeth Berg (,, ) I suspect that Maureen Corrigan might classify this one as geezer lit.and that's okay with me. The author does a brilliant job of sharing those reflections as they learn to appreciate their differences as well as developing insight into themselves.A number of other characters enter to create a community. Eve and Sally volunteer to take on the narrowboat over 300 miles of canals while Anastasia uses Eve's apartment during her treatment.As Sally and Eve learn the ropes of boating Britain's historic canals, they do the kind of reflection that only comes with travel and separation from one's everyday routines. Anastasia needs someone to get her narrowboat to the repair shop while she gets treatment for lung cancer. Sally is a homemaker who had decided to leave a loveless marriage, and Anastasia is facing a health crisis. ![]() Eve is an engineer who finds herself out of work. Three women in late middle age, heretofore unknown to one another, are at turning points in their lives. This delightful summer read is blend of a pilgrimage story and a little bit of epistolary book, though the "epistles' take the form of phone calls. At summer’s end, all three women must decide whether to return to the lives they left behind, or forge a new path forward.Ĭandid, hilarious, and uplifting, Anne Youngson's The Narrowboat Summer is a celebration of the power of friendship and new experiences to change one’s life, at any age. ![]() As they glide gently – and not so gently – through the countryside, the eccentricities and challenges of narrowboat life draw them inexorably together, and a tender and unforgettable story unfolds. Meet Eve, who has left her thirty-year career to become a Free Spirit Sally, who has waved goodbye to her indifferent husband and two grown-up children and Anastasia, a defiantly independent narrowboat-dweller, who is suddenly landlocked and vulnerable.īefore they quite know what they’ve done, Sally and Eve agree to drive Anastasia’s narrowboat on a journey through the canals of England, as she awaits a life-saving operation. “I just walked away,” she said, climbing on to the boat. ![]() ![]() She arrived on foot, with a rucksack and a carrier bag. It is also a soothing read, especially welcome in these anxious times.” - Christian Science Monitorįrom the author of Meet Me at the Museum, a charming novel of second chances, about three women, one dog, and the narrowboat that brings them togetherĮve expected Sally to come festooned with suitcases and overnight bags packed with everything she owned, but she was wrong. “Lovely.Another heartening story about the possibility of striking out in a new direction at any age. ![]()
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