The Whole World Over by Julia Glass
February 14th, 2007 by admin
This is the second novel by Julia Glass. Her first was “Three Junes” which was a national best-seller. Having not read “Three Junes” yet, I decided to read “The Whole World Over” based on the great reviews given to “Three Junes.”
In this book, Greenie Duquette, a bakery owner in Manhattan, supplies some of the area restaurants with her fabulous pastries. Walter is one of her good customers and a good friend as well. Ray McCrae, the governor of New Mexico, tastes Greenie’s coconut cake while at Walter’s restaurant and falls in love with Greenie’s cooking. Greenie is wooed into taking the chef’s job at the governor’s mansion.
Greenie takes the job even though her husband is not thrilled about it. Their marriage isn’t doing so well, so Greenie uses the move to New Mexico as a way to get away. At first she hopes her husband Alan will decide to join her. He uses his psychiatric practice in New York as a reason to not move with her even though his patients have been dwindling and Greenie has been the one earning the majority of their income. Greenie and Alan do stay in touch while she’s in New Mexico, often only because of their son George who is in New Mexico with Greenie.
Then Greenie runs into someone from her past who is now living in New Mexico and has an affair with him. It’s about this same time that Alan decides he is willing to move to New Mexico, but now Greenie is no longer sure what she wants.
This isn’t the only storyline in the book. There’s also Saga, who was injured in an accident and who now has a difficult time remembering things. She’s currently living with her uncle. Saga and Alan meet and develop a friendship.
Then there’s Walter, the friend of Greenie’s that recommended her to the governor of New Mexico for the job. He’s worried about being alone for the rest of his life. There’s some very sobering moments in the book as Walter thinks about the many friends he has lost to AIDS. Walter invites his nephew to New York to spend time with him and learn the restaurant business.
The timeline of the book includes, September 11, 2001, which as expected includes moments of confusion, terror, and sadness for the characters in the book.
After I finished reading the book, I was relieved because I didn’t enjoy the book the way I had hoped but I was also determined to read the entire book before passing judgment on it. Julia Glass is a good writer, but the story seems disjointed at times and doesn’t flow. The large number of characters in the book may have had something to do with it along with the sometimes overwhelming amount of detail that bordered on boring. I was also a little offended at the way she portrayed some of the characters. For example, she made Ray McCrae into a stereotypical brash and rough at the edges cowboy.
For me, the best part of the book were the pages devoted to 9/11 attack and the character’s handling of that terrible event, but I almost didn’t get to that part because it’s later in the book and I was about to give up reading it when I was in the middle of it because I just wasn’t enjoying it.
I wouldn’t go out of my way to purchase this book because it’s not one I would want to come back to and read again at a later date. If you want to read this book, borrow a copy of it from your local library.
My rating (0-10 smilies): 3 ☻☻☻☺☺☺☺☺☺☺