Fireworks Over Toccoa

Last night was our grand book club where we read Fireworks Over Toccoa by Jeffrey Stepakoff. I signed up for the ARC of the books through a book club sponsor with 5minutesforbooks.com. And, as my friend Lora said, it was great that we got the books if only to appreciate it when we choose GOOD books from now on...

There are several questions we needed to consider per our sponsorship and I'll cover those, first, and then get into what everyone thought of the book.

1. Was this a good bookclub book? If so, why? If not, why not?
I'm going with yes and no. I can see SOME bookclubs really liking this. I can see a group of women getting caught up in the supposed romance of it and kicking back with some wine and fantasizing about leaving their husbands over a book like this. However, that club is not our club. We all genuinely like our husbands and not many of us are the straight romance book kind of girls. So, for our club, it was not a great pick.

2. What themes or topics resonated with your bookclub?
I think, other than the sheer stupidity we all felt from the main character, was what exactly makes for a 'soul mate', if they actually exist.

3. What kind of identifications did you make with the book? For example, the place, being the wife/daughter etc of a soldier, being a young bride, etc.
None of us really identified with the book. We are all very, very different from anything presented in the book.

4. Were you able to have the author "join" you? What did you think of that?
No. We felt it better to not have him join us, due to the general dislike of the book among members.

5. How do you generally pick a book for a bookclub?
We have each member pick a book on their month. What they pick is entirely up to them.

Now. On to what we all thought (and be warned that I will be talking openly of all parts of the book because I am assuming after this none of you will want to read it and if you do...well. You should go in knowing what you are getting into.). This book, it is not great. It is all over the place and was apparently heavily channeling The Bridges of Madison County. Unfortunately, The Bridges of Madison County comes out looking like a masterpiece for the ages when compared, which is no easy feat, considering.

It was hard to be sympathetic toward Lily. We were given NO reason for her actions, but were supposed to be ok with her falling into bed with a man she met less than 24 hours prior while waiting for her husband to come home from war. NO reason at all was given why this should happen, other than disjointed scenes that showed her trying to buck convention. However, those scenes were so contrived and obviously written ONLY for the fact to have "evidence" that she was different and in tune in ways others around her were not. Sorry, not buying it. How she truly came off was a petulant child who had no business making grown up choices. I think we were all left with the feeling (as Shari said) of, if it truly meant that much to her and she was INDEED that girl who defied tradition SHE WOULD HAVE GONE AFTER HIM. At the very least, she would have found him, explained what happened and asked him to wait. But she did not. Which simply reinforced the idea that she was merely a child, bored and more concerned with not being her mother than anything remotely to do with heart. I could even overlook the fact that she was married and had an affair with a guy (her husband had been gone to war, etc, whatever. I'll give her that) if she was not such a weak character.

The fireworks. I just don't even know where to begin. I got the feeling the author wanted to write a book where fireworks were a metaphor for an intense sexual relationship (and not exactly subtle). And everything he came up with in this book stemmed from that desire. It felt forced and unreal; especially in the first part of the book before Lily even meets Jake.

What I think would have been an even more interesting book; not sell out by killing the husband (seriously, how contrived!) and starting the book the day after he comes home and how she has to handle either living with a man she loves (although minus a little passion) or telling him she is leaving to be with her soul mate (aka the man she met 48 hours before) and showing her life living with those actions. Or...well, just about any other ending, actually.

Overall, we were grateful for the opportunity to receive the ARCs and discuss this book, but in the end, the execution of the story, for us, fell very flat and poorly executed.

Up for next month: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies...I have a feeling this will be more our style!


(moon on your pyjamas, paul weller)