A few days ago, my twin sister sent me an e-mail telling me she’d just finished a great book called The Boston Girl and wondered had I heard of it? I laughed because I’d read it this week too! We don’t have many twin moments, but this was surely one.
Sometimes you just want a good sweeping family saga and this one was really quite enjoyable.
Publisher’s Summary: An unforgettable novel about a young Jewish woman growing up in Boston in the early twentieth century, told “with humor and optimism…through the eyes of an irresistible heroine” (People)—from the acclaimed author of The Red Tent.
Anita Diamant’s “vivid, affectionate portrait of American womanhood” (Los Angeles Times), follows the life of one woman, Addie Baum, through a period of dramatic change. Addie is The Boston Girl, the spirited daughter of an immigrant Jewish family, born in 1900 to parents who were unprepared for America and its effect on their three daughters. Growing up in the North End of Boston, then a teeming multicultural neighborhood, Addie’s intelligence and curiosity take her to a world her parents can’t imagine—a world of short skirts, movies, celebrity culture, and new opportunities for women. Addie wants to finish high school and dreams of going to college. She wants a career and to find true love. From the one-room tenement apartment she shared with her parents and two sisters, to the library group for girls she joins at a neighborhood settlement house, to her first, disastrous love affair, to finding the love of her life, eighty-five-year-old Addie recounts her adventures with humor and compassion for the naïve girl she once was.
Written with the same attention to historical detail and emotional resonance that made Diamant’s previous novels bestsellers, The Boston Girl is a moving portrait of one woman’s complicated life in twentieth century America, and a fascinating look at a generation of women finding their places in a changing world.
My sister listened to it on an Audiobook narrated by Linda Lavin and I gave it a listen…Lavin is fantastic.
Additionally, I finished The Notorious RBG a short but excellent biography of Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
I’d read Sonia Sotomayor’s memoir a few years ago and was curious to read about another Supreme Court Judge, especially as things heat up over appointing Justice Scalia’s successor.
I knew she must have been appointed for a good reason, but I had no idea about how much she had done for equal rights for man as well as women. Having read this short book, I’d actually like to read something a little longer about her.
booksandbassets 
Thanks for the recommendation! I’m adding this one to my TBR list!