My love of reading directly results from my mother, the most voracious reader I’ve ever known. A devotee of libraries, she would go every few weeks and bring home stacks of books that she devoured late into the night while the rest of the family slept.
One stack I recall from the ‘80s contained Tina Turner’s autobiography and a book by Henry Kissinger about the Nixon administration, perfectly illustrating how varied her interests were.
My mother taught me to read when I was 4, and I have fond memories of her taking me to the bookmobile in my neighborhood to pick out my own stack of books. I was generally given free rein to read whatever I chose. I steadily graduated from the Bobbsey Twins to Nancy Drew to Agatha Christie books.
Sometimes I read from my mother’s stack of books. I can still recall the alarm in her voice when she learned I’d read her copy of British author John Fowles’ 1963 debut “The Collector.” Considered a seminal precursor to the thriller genre, it’s a novel about a timid butterfly collector who kidnaps a young female art student and holds her captive in the cellar of his farmhouse. I’m sure most of it went over my head, but I can’t help wondering if it planted the seed for my love of true crime.
There was only one time when my mother intervened in my book selection. After a trip to the mall in my early teens, I brought home a bookstore purchase titled “I Couldn’t Smoke the Grass on My Father’s Lawn: Pot, Girls and Swingers in London’s Ultra-Mod Set” by Michael Chaplin, son of silent film star Charlie Chaplin.
I was quite excited to read it, but my mother immediately confiscated it. I stormed off to my bedroom to sulk, and a little later she entered my room to hand me a copy of “The Catcher in the Rye.” I grew up in a family where much was often left unsaid, but I recognized after reading Salinger’s classic that it was her way of acknowledging I had entered my “disaffected youth” phase.
Once I became an adult, my mother and I derived much pleasure from sharing books and recommending authors to each other. She was a big fan of novelist Anne Tyler, the Baltimore-based Pulitzer Prize-winner who wrote “Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant,” “The Accidental Tourist” and “Breathing Lessons,” among others, and I became a fan, too. We loved Tyler’s gentle stories about ordinary — albeit quirky — people doing mostly ordinary things as they fumbled their way through life and strove for human connection.
I haven’t read Tyler in years, but the 83-year-old author recently published her 25th novel, “Three Days in June” (Knopf, $27). It centers on a divorced couple in their 60s who are reunited by their daughter’s wedding, which stirs up memories of their own marriage and what went wrong. I wish I could tell my mother all about it, but she died in 2013. What I wouldn’t give for us to be able to read it together and compare notes. Instead, in her honor this Mother’s Day weekend, I’ll read it solo as a show of appreciation for the love of books she instilled in me.
Speaking of moms, two upcoming events celebrate new books that place moms at the center of their narratives.
Poe & Company Bookstore in Milton hosts a Mother’s Day Tea celebrating New York Times bestselling author Kristy Woodson Harvey’s new book, “Beach House Rules” (Gallery Books, $28.99).
When their home is seized by the FBI after her husband is arrested for a white-collar crime, Charlotte and her daughter Iris seek refuge in a beachfront community in North Carolina. There, they meet a group of single mothers with whom they bond. Then they discover a secret that links the women, and they begin to wonder if there is a reason they’ve come together.
Harvey will be joined in conversation by Mary Kay Andrews. Both authors are cofounders of Friends & Fiction web show and podcast that includes Patti Callahan Henry and Kristin Harmel. The Mother’s Day Tea is May 8 and will be held at The RoofTop at Crabapple Market. Ticket price includes tea and a signed copy. For details go to poeandcompanybookstore.com.
Erika J. Simpson is the author of “This is Your Mother” (Scribner, $27.99), a gripping memoir about growing up with a complicated mother who endured many trials and missteps but always dreamed of a better future. The Atlanta History Center presents Simpson in an author talk May 8 at the Margaret Mitchell House. For details go to atlantahistorycenter.com
Suzanne Van Atten is a book critic and contributing editor to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. She may be reached at Suzanne.VanAtten@ajc.com.
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