In a Distant Valley

Hi Bookworms, how is everyone doing? It’s been another rocky week in news. And who knows what’ll happen next week, but I’ll continue my pink skies theme that I started last week as a salve of sorts. I also started a puzzle I received for Christmas and I recommend puzzling in troubled times and plenty of dog walks too. I advise keeping busy with work, reading, and all what you do. I’ve been caught up a bit in watching the NFL playoffs lately and this week the Australian Open tennis will be on. I’m a junkie for that too. Meanwhile it’s been mild and windy here and the snow is gone now. I took this photo, above, early last week looking down our dead-end street. I hope it gives you a peaceful easy feeling. 

In my library haul this week, I picked up these three books and they look good to me. The Atwood memoir is huge. It’s 624 pages long and I probably won’t get to it fully this time, but it’s easy to open up anywhere and start reading and enjoy an anecdote from her life. She has much to say that is wise and entertaining too. The other two pictured are recent novels, which I might start later, but this week I plan to begin the Edith Wharton novel The House of Mirth for my upcoming online class. I finished Edith’s autobiography recently and man she was an active lady. 

And now I’ll leave you with a few reviews of what I finished lately.  All of them could be rounded up to 4 stars.

In a Distant Valley by Shannon Bowring / Europa / 336 pages / 2025

3.75 stars. I was glad to return to this series (a trilogy), which was a buddy read with Tina at the blog Turn the Page, about the inhabitants of small town Dalton, Maine. Bowring writes about the characters there so seamlessly that we know them quite well after the first two books … slightly similar to how Elizabeth Strout does in her novels about those in Cosby, Maine. 

This last novel in Bowring’s trilogy focuses on what happens when Tommy (Rose’s abusive ex-partner) returns to town saying he’s changed his bad drinking ways and wants to see their two sons. But then angry Tommy loses a job and proves to be a handful as usual … which isn’t good for Rose and her budding relationship with Nate Theroux, the cop who still grieves his late wife with his young daughter. Tommy has much beef with Nate … and the conflict between them later boils over into a showdown. 

Meanwhile a subplot sees college student Greg Fortin going on a date … a drive into the forest with Angela when a snowstorm hits and things get dicey. These two plotlines — with Tommy/Nate and Greg/Angela — keep things churning and the goodness of the characters — particularly those of Nate and Greg — shine through. 

The story at times seems to get a tad sentimental among its cast and how things turn out, but Bowring’s such an apt storyteller that she’s able to pull it off and make for quite a satisfying ending for her trilogy. She’s perhaps not as dark as Strout, but her characters have had their fair share of knocks. I will follow what Bowring writes next, though I will miss these well-known characters and the town of Dalton. It’s sad to see them go. 

I listened to the audiobook along with the two earlier books — all narrated superbly by Patricia Shade. 

The Ferryman and His Wife by Frode Grytten / Algonquin / 176 pages / 2025

3.75 stars. An older Norwegian man (Nils Vik) wakes on the last day of his life. He’s a ferryman — a man of the fjord — who transports passengers all about. It’s a meditative tale as Nils looks back on his life — how he started his job at age 14 — and those he ferried in all types of situations and to his two daughters, and wife who has pre-deceased him. 

On this last day he’s on his ferryboat and starts seeing the dead appear to him talking. People he once knew. He’s joined by his dead dog Luna on the boat and sees others he knew along the shore. He recalls those he ferried, their issues, and incidents that took place. He also fondly recalls his wife, their love, and what their lives were together and how she passed. It’s a bit sad but also atmospheric of his life on the fjord out on the water for decades in his boat. It’s beautiful in a way, he was made for it — and that’s how a life should be.

This short novel translated from the Norwegian by Alison McCullough is my second translated book of 2026, yay… and my second Scandinavian tale. My Norwegian cousins would be pleased.  

The Wedding People by Alison Espach / Holt / 384 pages / 2024

3.75 stars.I’m quite late to the party getting to this popular novel about a depressed woman who comes to stay at a fancy hotel in Newport, Rhode Island and gets mixed up with a large wedding party that’s there for six days. In the process it seems to change her thinking and turn her life around in ways. The protagonist Phoebe Stone, a professor of Lit, is upset after her divorce and a miscarriage that leaves her devastated.

Now she’s come to the hotel — not with good intentions. But then she meets a nice man in the hot tub and the bride Lila, who’s a bit of a piece of work. And before she knows it, she’s spending time with “the wedding people” at the hotel. 

I thought parts of the story were clever and funny and I laughed aloud a bit as I listened to the audiobook (narrated well by Helen Laser). You hope for the woman protagonist Phoebe that she won’t harm herself, and it seems to go from a serious drama to being a bit of an over the top farce in a short time. That was fine. My only quibble was that it seems to go on a bit too much in places (some of the sex gibberish). It felt a little overly long and stuffed and gets a tad wearisome. Still it has its bright spots and is a fun romp of sorts.

That’s all for now. I’ll save the Wharton autobiography review for next week. What about you — have you read these and what did you think?