I Couldn’t Love You More
I reserved this book at the library and it came in right away…but now it is due basically yesterday because someone else has put in on hold. I love thinking about the zipzapzing of books being shelved and shuttled from one branch to another. Who had this book before me? Did they like it? Is it someone similar to me…or is it, like, an 85-year-old man? And in the case of a *kind of* obscure book — meaning it’s not the latest hot new release that’s being made into a movie — I really, really wish I knew who was checking it out it too.
Turns out that I Couldn’t Love You More by Esther Freud isn’t as obscure as I thought. This novel — so reminiscent of Sebastian Barry’s The Secret Scripture (i.e. Irish mother-and-baby-homes, although this book has a more contemporary spin) — was actually Elisabeth Egan’s July pick for the NYT “Group Text” column.
Where are the others who have read Freud’s novels? (Yes, she’s the great-granddaughter of Sigmund and the daughter of the painter Lucian, and if you remember a movie called Hideous Kinky starring Kate Winslet…well, she wrote the book upon which it’s based.) Do you, too, wonder who’s reading these one-tier-down from mega bestsellers — possibly at the same time as you? Because I would love to talk to these mysterious people about how I Couldn’t Love You More speeds up with incredible momentum and buildsbuildsbuilds until you just. can’t. wait. to discuss it with someone. But who?
originally published on instagram