Tots100 Book Club: The American Wife – Curtis Sittenfeld

You can’t beat getting into a good book – that feeling when you finish a fabulous yarn and wish you were still in the middle of it, is like a mild grief. I’m certain most readers have experienced seeing someone reading one of their favourite reads and wishing they hadn’t read that book yet.

My love of reading takes me back to my early teens when I used to stay awake until the early hours, reading secretly by the light of the street light through my blinds – I was always so grateful that we didn’t live a couple of houses further up the road where they didn’t have a street light.

I try to read a variety of genres but seem to lean towards realistic stories and biographies – Like a lot of people, I occasionally feel I’ve got into a rut with what I’m reading. This happened about 7 years ago and I joined a local library book group – I’ve never looked back.

I’ve been asked by the Tots100 to recommend my favourite book to another reader – no problem there. I choose The American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld. This book was a real surprise for me – I’m not particularly interested in reading political novels so perhaps wouldn’t have normally picked up this book but I had heard other people talking about how good Curtis Sittenfeld’s novels are so gave it a go.

The story is about Alice Blackwell, a seemingly normal girl growing up. What I loved about this book was how ‘normal’ Alice seemed. I don’t want to give too much away as for me most of the beauty of the book was not having a clue what was coming next – I will tell you that there is an accident and that I was completely shocked. The writing was brilliant here. The story goes on to describe Alice during her time being the President’s Wife – there are rumours that the book is based on the life of Barbara Bush – this makes it even more fascinating.

This was definitely a book that was difficult to put down. I remember not getting an awful lot else done when I read it and I’ve still got that sense of wishing I could read it all over again for the first time.

I’d like to recommend this book to Kate from the Five F’s blog – its always a bit nerve wracking suggesting a book to someone else in case they think it is pants – hopefully I’m safe with this one though!