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Entering Normal
In the tradition of The Good Mother and The Deep End of the Ocean, Anne D. LeClaire delivers a heartbreaking–and breathtaking–novel of two very different but equally loving mothers who face the most painful of losses and then find the courage not only to go on but to find meaning and hope in their lives.
Rose Nelson is a middle-aged woman with a broken past, a sorrow from which she cannot recover. Secretly guilty about her role in her teenaged son’s death five years ago, she has sealed herself off from life, enveloped by a grief that has slowly eaten away at her relationship with her husband.
Against her will, Rose is drawn into the world she has avoided when Opal Gates and her five-year-old son, Zack, move in next door. Determined to start an independent life for herself, twenty-year-old Opal has left her family and the father of her son in North Carolina. But when she quickly begins an affair with Tyrone Miller, a part-time mechanic and local musician, Opal unwittingly breaks the tacit rules of both her family and her new hometown.
Initially, Rose cannot bear the sight of Opal and her son. But later when Zack is injured, she instinctively lies to protect Opal from a single mistake that changes the lives of everyone involved.
Faced with a custody suit brought by Zack’s father and her own parents, Opal faces a trial in which each choice she has made will be used as ammunition in the battle to take Zack away from her.
Confronting such devastating loss and the questions it poses are at the heart of Entering Normal. How does one go on after great tragedy? What is a family? What sacrifices must a mother be willing to make for her child? And how can a good mother sometimes make bad choices?
Entering Normal is a story of family, a novel about courage, loss, risk, and betrayal. It is a story that goes to the heart of love.
From the Hardcover edition.
Rose Nelson is a middle-aged woman with a broken past, a sorrow from which she cannot recover. Secretly guilty about her role in her teenaged son’s death five years ago, she has sealed herself off from life, enveloped by a grief that has slowly eaten away at her relationship with her husband.
Against her will, Rose is drawn into the world she has avoided when Opal Gates and her five-year-old son, Zack, move in next door. Determined to start an independent life for herself, twenty-year-old Opal has left her family and the father of her son in North Carolina. But when she quickly begins an affair with Tyrone Miller, a part-time mechanic and local musician, Opal unwittingly breaks the tacit rules of both her family and her new hometown.
Initially, Rose cannot bear the sight of Opal and her son. But later when Zack is injured, she instinctively lies to protect Opal from a single mistake that changes the lives of everyone involved.
Faced with a custody suit brought by Zack’s father and her own parents, Opal faces a trial in which each choice she has made will be used as ammunition in the battle to take Zack away from her.
Confronting such devastating loss and the questions it poses are at the heart of Entering Normal. How does one go on after great tragedy? What is a family? What sacrifices must a mother be willing to make for her child? And how can a good mother sometimes make bad choices?
Entering Normal is a story of family, a novel about courage, loss, risk, and betrayal. It is a story that goes to the heart of love.
From the Hardcover edition.
336 pages, Paperback
First published May 29, 2001
22 people are currently reading
253 people want to read
About the author
Anne D. LeClaire
30 books98 followersI grew up on a farm in a small town in Western Massachusetts, the middle of three daughters of a school teacher mother and an electrician father. I was the family "story-teller," not always meant in the good way. In fact, I love that while I was once punished for making up stories, I now get paid for it.
Okay, so I was a small town girl. But my ambitions were as fanciful as they were impractical. My early career choices were fueled by dreams nurtured in our town library where books fired my imagination. At various times I dreamt of being an FBI agent, a girl detective, a pilot, a spy and a cow girl.
I'm a graduate of the MacDuffie School in Springfield, Massachusetts and an alumna of Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, North Adams, Massachusetts and Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.
I met my future husband, Hillary, while on summer break from college. It's a classic summer story. Co-ed goes to Cape Cod for a summer job, meets and falls in love with a native and ends up living on the Cape. We now live in the seaside village of South Chatham and have two children, Hope D’Avril and Christopher, and sixteen chickens.
While raising a family, I was no closer to being the F.B.I. agent or cowgirl but did work as a radio broadcaster, an actress, a journalist and a correspondent for The Boston Globe. My work appeared in The New York Times, Redbook, and Yankee magazine, among others.
It wasn't until 1983 that, pursuing a long-held dream and encouraged by the fiction editor of Yankee, I quit my journalism jobs and began a novel, Land’s End, which was published by Bantam Books in 1985. I have since written eight other novels, including the critically acclaimed Entering Normal, The Lavender Hour, and Leaving Eden. My work has been published in many countries including Great Britain, Italy, Greece, France, Japan, Germany, Portugal, Poland, Russia, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Czechoslovakia, Slovakia, Netherlands, Brazil and Israel.
My first book-length non-fiction, Listening Below the Noise, is a meditation on the practice of silence. In addition to novels and the memoir, I write short stories and essays. I also teach and lecture here and abroad on the creative process, as well as on the practice of silence. I have taught creative writing on Cape Cod, in France, Ireland and Jamaica, at the Maui Writers Conference, and to women in prison.
My essays have been included in a number of anthologies, among them I’ve Always Meant to Tell You, Letters to Our Mothers: An Anthology of Contemporary Women Writers; From Daughters and Sons to Fathers: What I’ve Never Said; and A Sense of Place: An Anthology of Cape Women Writers.
My interests are gardening, yoga, theater, travel and aviation (I am a private pilot). I'm also interested in genealogy and am a cousin of the poet Emily Dickinson.
Okay, so I was a small town girl. But my ambitions were as fanciful as they were impractical. My early career choices were fueled by dreams nurtured in our town library where books fired my imagination. At various times I dreamt of being an FBI agent, a girl detective, a pilot, a spy and a cow girl.
I'm a graduate of the MacDuffie School in Springfield, Massachusetts and an alumna of Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, North Adams, Massachusetts and Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.
I met my future husband, Hillary, while on summer break from college. It's a classic summer story. Co-ed goes to Cape Cod for a summer job, meets and falls in love with a native and ends up living on the Cape. We now live in the seaside village of South Chatham and have two children, Hope D’Avril and Christopher, and sixteen chickens.
While raising a family, I was no closer to being the F.B.I. agent or cowgirl but did work as a radio broadcaster, an actress, a journalist and a correspondent for The Boston Globe. My work appeared in The New York Times, Redbook, and Yankee magazine, among others.
It wasn't until 1983 that, pursuing a long-held dream and encouraged by the fiction editor of Yankee, I quit my journalism jobs and began a novel, Land’s End, which was published by Bantam Books in 1985. I have since written eight other novels, including the critically acclaimed Entering Normal, The Lavender Hour, and Leaving Eden. My work has been published in many countries including Great Britain, Italy, Greece, France, Japan, Germany, Portugal, Poland, Russia, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Czechoslovakia, Slovakia, Netherlands, Brazil and Israel.
My first book-length non-fiction, Listening Below the Noise, is a meditation on the practice of silence. In addition to novels and the memoir, I write short stories and essays. I also teach and lecture here and abroad on the creative process, as well as on the practice of silence. I have taught creative writing on Cape Cod, in France, Ireland and Jamaica, at the Maui Writers Conference, and to women in prison.
My essays have been included in a number of anthologies, among them I’ve Always Meant to Tell You, Letters to Our Mothers: An Anthology of Contemporary Women Writers; From Daughters and Sons to Fathers: What I’ve Never Said; and A Sense of Place: An Anthology of Cape Women Writers.
My interests are gardening, yoga, theater, travel and aviation (I am a private pilot). I'm also interested in genealogy and am a cousin of the poet Emily Dickinson.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 74 reviews
December 7, 2019
"Señor, amo a Zack. Es mi vida. No seré una madre perfecta. Diablos, estoy segura de que no soy una madre perfecta. No sé si existen. Pero amo a mi hijo. Lo amo tanto que no pensé que fuera posible amar a alguien como lo amo a él. Desde que nació estuvimos solos él y yo, nadie más. Ni mi madre ni mi padre. Ni Billy. Sé que he cometido errores pero Zack es feliz conmigo. Le leo, es inteligente. Lo matarían si lo apartaran de mí. Y me matarían a mí, su señoría. Sin ninguna duda me matarían.
Este libro trata sobre Opal, una muchacha de 20 años con un hijo llamado Zack que, en un intento desesperado por librarse de sus padres y la opresión de Billy, el padre de Zack, decide mudarse a un pueblo guiada por señales en las que ella confía, ahí conoce a Rosa y Ned Nelson, quienes también nos contarán su vida a través de sus ojos, una historia de amor puro y muchos pero muchos giros inesperados.
Me gustó muchísimo el libro, amé lo fuerte, decidida y amorosa que es Opal, un personaje verdaderamente impresionante, el amor que ella siente por su hijo de cinco años es bellísimo, hasta nos hace amarlo a él también.
En cuanto a Rosa, la odié en un principio, tan monótona y metida en su burbuja siempre que dejaba a un lado a su esposo Ned.
Y a Ned también lo amé, un señor lleno de amor por su esposa, trabajador y confortable, me dolía mi corazón cuando Rosa lo ignoraba :(.
En sí es un muy buen libro y me hizo llorar algunas veces, muy recomendado.
Este libro trata sobre Opal, una muchacha de 20 años con un hijo llamado Zack que, en un intento desesperado por librarse de sus padres y la opresión de Billy, el padre de Zack, decide mudarse a un pueblo guiada por señales en las que ella confía, ahí conoce a Rosa y Ned Nelson, quienes también nos contarán su vida a través de sus ojos, una historia de amor puro y muchos pero muchos giros inesperados.
Me gustó muchísimo el libro, amé lo fuerte, decidida y amorosa que es Opal, un personaje verdaderamente impresionante, el amor que ella siente por su hijo de cinco años es bellísimo, hasta nos hace amarlo a él también.
En cuanto a Rosa, la odié en un principio, tan monótona y metida en su burbuja siempre que dejaba a un lado a su esposo Ned.
Y a Ned también lo amé, un señor lleno de amor por su esposa, trabajador y confortable, me dolía mi corazón cuando Rosa lo ignoraba :(.
En sí es un muy buen libro y me hizo llorar algunas veces, muy recomendado.
November 30, 2011
I enjoyed this book because, as flawed as the two main characters were, I could relate to both of them. As a once-20-yr-old mother, who made her own share of mistakes because of immaturity, I could relate to Opal. As a middle-aged woman who lost a teenage child, I could relate to Rose and the fact that her grief was a constant part of her life. Yet both these characters carried those traits to extremes that, thank God, I did not.
The book is well written. There are a couple of surprising twists thrown into what would otherwise be just a "situation" rather than a plot. Male readers would probably hate it this boo, but I personally found it a very good read.
The book is well written. There are a couple of surprising twists thrown into what would otherwise be just a "situation" rather than a plot. Male readers would probably hate it this boo, but I personally found it a very good read.
October 25, 2017
I loved this book. At first, I couldn't decide if I should continue reading it because I could see there would be some sadness in it. A young mother faces losing her son and is befriended by her neighbor who lost her son years ago. I'm glad I stuck with the book because the ending was satisfying.
July 6, 2016
For me, the story of how I came by this book is actually more interesting than the book itself.
I was on a family road trip and had forgotten to pack two essential items: binoculars and a book. We had been traveling all day up the coast of Maine and stopped at the Country Inn in Camden, ME to spend the night. We just fell upon the inn, having not made reservations, not knowing where we would be by night fall. What a gem it turned out to be. With a quaint, Americana them, our rooms were spacious, one had a fireplace, another a sitting room and balcony.
After a comfortable nights rest we headed to the breakfast room for fresh fruit (delicious honey dew, cantaloupe and pineapple), eggs, and home made waffles with blueberry syrup. As I headed for a table I noticed a floor to ceiling bookshelf with a message to help myself, or exchange a book. Wonderful. I perused the shelves while having breakfast and decided on Entering Normal.
Thank you to the folks at the Country Inn for making shelf space available for the book exchange and thanks to an unknown fellow traveler who left Entering Normal for me to find.
As for the book. . . it has a couple touching moments, but all in all it's fairly dull, characters flat, and predictable. I really can't recommend the book but I highly recommend the Country Inn in Camden, Maine. Don't forget to bring a book to exchange.
I was on a family road trip and had forgotten to pack two essential items: binoculars and a book. We had been traveling all day up the coast of Maine and stopped at the Country Inn in Camden, ME to spend the night. We just fell upon the inn, having not made reservations, not knowing where we would be by night fall. What a gem it turned out to be. With a quaint, Americana them, our rooms were spacious, one had a fireplace, another a sitting room and balcony.
After a comfortable nights rest we headed to the breakfast room for fresh fruit (delicious honey dew, cantaloupe and pineapple), eggs, and home made waffles with blueberry syrup. As I headed for a table I noticed a floor to ceiling bookshelf with a message to help myself, or exchange a book. Wonderful. I perused the shelves while having breakfast and decided on Entering Normal.
Thank you to the folks at the Country Inn for making shelf space available for the book exchange and thanks to an unknown fellow traveler who left Entering Normal for me to find.
As for the book. . . it has a couple touching moments, but all in all it's fairly dull, characters flat, and predictable. I really can't recommend the book but I highly recommend the Country Inn in Camden, Maine. Don't forget to bring a book to exchange.
December 1, 2017
I thought this was a good, solid story. It's about the coincidences of life and how they sometimes play a role in the development of relationships. It's about loving and letting go. It's about love lost and love gained. It was a good overall story. It is more of a chic lit story than a romance. I enjoyed that aspect as well. I like that it showed the strength of women and how they can unite to help each other. A worthy read.
December 5, 2014
4 STARS
"In Anne D. LeClaire's Entering Normal, two women are bound by the shared trials of motherhood: birth, hope, separation, and grief. Though Rose Nelson is an older woman still mourning her son, who died five years ago, and Opal Gates is a young single mother scrabbling to raise her 5-year-old son, the two women begin to cleave together.
Both move through their worlds in a dreamlike trance, only surfacing above their own self-absorption when confronted by the violence of life: infidelity, passion, jealousy, and death. Though emotionally clueless men bumble around Rose and Opal, they are never able to pierce through these women's barriers. Rose and Opal are too convinced of their own needs--Opal believes she needs no one, while Rose focuses only on her dead son. As the two begin to find each other, the reader awaits the moments of growth that allow them to see beyond themselves." (From Amazon)
I picked this novel up for $2 not thinking anything of it and was pleasantly surprised how good it was. A funny warm novel.
"In Anne D. LeClaire's Entering Normal, two women are bound by the shared trials of motherhood: birth, hope, separation, and grief. Though Rose Nelson is an older woman still mourning her son, who died five years ago, and Opal Gates is a young single mother scrabbling to raise her 5-year-old son, the two women begin to cleave together.
Both move through their worlds in a dreamlike trance, only surfacing above their own self-absorption when confronted by the violence of life: infidelity, passion, jealousy, and death. Though emotionally clueless men bumble around Rose and Opal, they are never able to pierce through these women's barriers. Rose and Opal are too convinced of their own needs--Opal believes she needs no one, while Rose focuses only on her dead son. As the two begin to find each other, the reader awaits the moments of growth that allow them to see beyond themselves." (From Amazon)
I picked this novel up for $2 not thinking anything of it and was pleasantly surprised how good it was. A funny warm novel.
January 17, 2014
Entering Normal by Anne D. LeClaire is a heartfelt book that I enjoyed reading, her words really spoke to me. Her word choice was what blew me away, sometimes it made it difficult because of her choice of words but in the end I really got a lot out of it. What really made this book so interesting for me to read was because it was a story of a normal girl, someone who was going through things that people have to deal with in everyday life. Betrayal, loss, taking risks for the ones you love, these all are apart of how we live our lives. It makes you wonder what your life would be like if you were her, it makes you question your own life and if what’s going on is so much worse that what Opal and many other people in the world are going through. I would recommend this book to the people out there who don’t really like they fit in, or those who just want to sit down and read a book thats leaves you with questions that don’t really have an answer.
June 12, 2012
I found this to be an engaging read, but ultimately some aspects of the characters just aren't believable. Rose is a bit *too* shut down; Ned is a bit *too* uncommunicative and in denial; Opal is a bit *too* clueless about certain things. It would be OK if they started off that way and gradually evolved, but instead, like in many almost-good books, they feel very static for the first two-thirds or so of the book, and then have sudden insights very rapidly in the last third. As a result, I found the middle third very frustrating, because I wanted the characters to be gaining some self-awareness, but they just weren't. Still, it's a good summer book and hard to put down because you do find yourself really hoping that things work out for these somewhat quirky but sincere characters.
July 19, 2013
I never wanted this book to end because I fell in love with the two main characters, especially the older married woman who has lost her son to a car accident. I could identify with her living for years and suffering with guilt and sorrow. The friendship that develops between the older and the younger woman provides such redemption for the characters and for the reader also. The beginning doesn't look good for a relationship between the two, and so the ending of the book is very satisfying. I recommend this book to any woman who has ever carried a heavy emotional burden and felt all alone in her life, even when married with children all around her; this book will give you a good, warm feeling.
July 5, 2010
This book was a bit of a disappointment... A friend of mine suggested that I read it and I thought why not? Well, to start of the characters are rather poorly developed and the plot is merely designed to support the end.
As far as the ending itself is concerned, it nearly killed me with its cliched quality. I can only give Leclaire credit for her simplicity.
As far as the ending itself is concerned, it nearly killed me with its cliched quality. I can only give Leclaire credit for her simplicity.
May 1, 2021
I just finished this sweet and heart warming story about two very different women.
Being the person that I am, I strongly criticized Opal’s every decision and action. Again, being the person that I am, I felt for Rose, but got angry with her for her endless grief and the fact that she had given up on life.
The book continued its plot and I got to less judge and more sympathize with the characters. I am glad that the characters did not get a happily ever after, but somehow found a way through, despite their original intentions.
A nice book, which might not have been my original choice of reading, but finding it in a compilation, now I am glad that I did bot skip, but read it.
Being the person that I am, I strongly criticized Opal’s every decision and action. Again, being the person that I am, I felt for Rose, but got angry with her for her endless grief and the fact that she had given up on life.
The book continued its plot and I got to less judge and more sympathize with the characters. I am glad that the characters did not get a happily ever after, but somehow found a way through, despite their original intentions.
A nice book, which might not have been my original choice of reading, but finding it in a compilation, now I am glad that I did bot skip, but read it.
May 25, 2021
Young mum Opal, gets in her car and drives until she runs out of fuel. She finds herself in 'Normal' a small quiet town, far away from her family and the father of her five year old child.
She tries to befriend her neighbours who have had their own trauma, losing their son, but Rose is still grieving deeply and does not approve of Opal.
When Billy, Opal's ex partner decides he wants his son back they are thrown together in difficult circumstances. They discover some things are worth fighting for.
Opal, despite her youth and faults is a very likeable character.
Rose is a surprise to herself.
An emotive read in parts.
She tries to befriend her neighbours who have had their own trauma, losing their son, but Rose is still grieving deeply and does not approve of Opal.
When Billy, Opal's ex partner decides he wants his son back they are thrown together in difficult circumstances. They discover some things are worth fighting for.
Opal, despite her youth and faults is a very likeable character.
Rose is a surprise to herself.
An emotive read in parts.
September 30, 2018
I really enjoyed this novel. It is an intimate look into the lives of two very different mothers. It is a story of loss, heartbreak, and betrayal. But it is also a story of love, friendship and hope. Opal tries and fails to run away from her past and Rose tries to hold on to the past, the past before the death of her son. These two make for very unlikely friends but it is this friendship that gives them the courage to face difficult realities.
April 13, 2020
L'amore di una donna per il proprio figlio ed un tribunale. Scene di vita comune con un pizzico di pepe. Lettura tranquilla se si vuole staccare da qualcosa di più impegnativo. Potrebbe essere un libro da ombrellone. Lo consiglio per chi come me è restio ad affrontare queste tematiche all'apparenza noiose.
December 7, 2019
What a perfect slice of life book! I became completely engrossed in these characters’ lives ... rooting for them to triumph and commiserating with them through their trials ... absolutely loved it!
September 30, 2020
A thoroughly enjoyable example of a relationship novel. No unnecessary waffle, characters that felt real, a story that moved swiftly and easily but with occasional surprises. This is the kind of book I wish I could write and made a change from the thrillers I usually read.
September 2, 2022
I really enjoy Anne LeClaire’s writing and her insights into human relationships. Her characters seem very “real”. This book delves into grief, loss, estrangement, and the maturing of a young single mother. Human connections can be made when we least expect them.
May 2, 2024
This would have been a 5star book for me, I thoroughly enjoyed reading it and loved the characters, however I just didn't like the end! Not sure which way it could have gone but felt it let the rest of the book down. A good read though!
August 11, 2019
This book surprised me. I didn't have a lot of hope in the beginning but it reeled me in, and I fell in love with the characters.
February 23, 2021
A Hallmark movie of a book
May 3, 2021
An easy read with likeable characters and realistic situations. The ending seemed too quick and left open for a sequel.
September 11, 2022
Le circostanze fanno più dei pre-giudizi
Romanzo da ombrellone, piacevole
Romanzo da ombrellone, piacevole
May 5, 2024
A feel good story about people with faults and needs
September 8, 2022
Great story. Following Opal's journey was quite interesting. The ending was unexpected. There were parts where I actually cried. At the end of the day, I enjoyed it and I'm glad that I read it.
December 27, 2013
Bless me, Father, for I have procrastinated. As I have confessed before, sometimes a book will sit on my shelf long enough to start asking for the car keys before I get to it. This novel shows a publication date of 2001, but actually takes place in 1990, and so it has a rather antique feel to it, with people listening to cassettes and not having cell phones or caller ID, and fetching their dinner by hunting mastodons. Okay, I made that last bit up. That said, this is still a really enjoyable read.
The story concerns Rose, a woman in her late fifties and married to the very steady Ned, who asks her every morning "So what's on your agenda today?", as if one day differed very much from any other. The one day in Rose and Ned's life that was shockingly, horribly different was the day five years before, when their teenage son and only child died in a road accident. Ned is waiting for his Rosie to come back; Rose doesn't really see anything to come back to.
Enter Opal Gates, a twenty year old single mother of a five year old son, a believer in signs, a doll maker and a southerner, who moves in next door to Rose and Ned on their street in Normal, Massachusetts. Opal, whose name used to be Tammy Raylee Gates before she legally changed it, threw a die and when it landed on three, she decided to drive three tanks of gas away from her home of New Zion, North Carolina, and stop there. She was aiming to get away from her boring ex-jock boyfriend (the father of Zach, her son) and also from her overbearing, hyper-critical mother Melva, who apparently never made a mistake in her life. Step aside Jesus, here's a *really* perfect person, and she's not shy about hammering her very different daughter over the head with that fact. Oh I love it when I can identify!
At first, Rose thinks that Opal is basically trailer trash, and is horrified at Opal's casual attitude toward her son's little mishaps, saying, "Boys bounce." Rose knows that, sometimes, they don't. Circumstances, however, will bring these two women together (just like in a novel!) and they will find that they need each other's help and kindness to get through when trouble comes to both their doorsteps in the form of a heart attack suffered by Ned and a custody suit brought by Zach's father, backed by--you guessed it--Melva.
I found myself caring a lot for both of these very believable, flawed, likeable women, as well as Ned. I was amused by how well this woman author depicted auto mechanic Ned and the way he thinks. I recommend this book for anyone who enjoys a good human story.
The story concerns Rose, a woman in her late fifties and married to the very steady Ned, who asks her every morning "So what's on your agenda today?", as if one day differed very much from any other. The one day in Rose and Ned's life that was shockingly, horribly different was the day five years before, when their teenage son and only child died in a road accident. Ned is waiting for his Rosie to come back; Rose doesn't really see anything to come back to.
Enter Opal Gates, a twenty year old single mother of a five year old son, a believer in signs, a doll maker and a southerner, who moves in next door to Rose and Ned on their street in Normal, Massachusetts. Opal, whose name used to be Tammy Raylee Gates before she legally changed it, threw a die and when it landed on three, she decided to drive three tanks of gas away from her home of New Zion, North Carolina, and stop there. She was aiming to get away from her boring ex-jock boyfriend (the father of Zach, her son) and also from her overbearing, hyper-critical mother Melva, who apparently never made a mistake in her life. Step aside Jesus, here's a *really* perfect person, and she's not shy about hammering her very different daughter over the head with that fact. Oh I love it when I can identify!
At first, Rose thinks that Opal is basically trailer trash, and is horrified at Opal's casual attitude toward her son's little mishaps, saying, "Boys bounce." Rose knows that, sometimes, they don't. Circumstances, however, will bring these two women together (just like in a novel!) and they will find that they need each other's help and kindness to get through when trouble comes to both their doorsteps in the form of a heart attack suffered by Ned and a custody suit brought by Zach's father, backed by--you guessed it--Melva.
I found myself caring a lot for both of these very believable, flawed, likeable women, as well as Ned. I was amused by how well this woman author depicted auto mechanic Ned and the way he thinks. I recommend this book for anyone who enjoys a good human story.
March 10, 2012
"Entering Normal" is the story of two women and the intersection of their lives in small-town New England. The characters are somewhat stereotypical. Rose Nelson is a middle-aged Yankee closed off to the world after the death of her son. Southerner Opal Gates is on the lam from her family and son's father, gushing "Shugah" endearments. Opal seems to run her life by signs, whether a roll of a die or fruit sticker on the kitchen cabinets. They collide in Normal, MA, as reluctant neighbors, and for Rose, even more reluctant friends. The plot is predictable-Opal falls for the town bad boy, Rose faces her son's death and the ultimate collision course of the two women. With the exception of some twists, the outcome is fairly sanguine.
"Entering Normal"is a quick, light read, not unpleasant, just a little too easy to figure out.
"Entering Normal"is a quick, light read, not unpleasant, just a little too easy to figure out.
April 9, 2013
The beginning of the book really had me worried that this would be not a book for a teenager, but the further you got into it the more it pulls you in! I loved the contradiction between the two main characters, Rose and Opal. But though many twist and turns thy become great friends. What I didn't like was (spoiler!) that Rose's husband died. It was so random and not needed. I just really didn't like it at all, but it did bring rose and opal closer. I like the style of the two minds of the women, switching on and off in there lives. It really helps picture the whole story. I would suggest this to anyone that likes twist and turns in there books. Where something happens and just don't see it coming.
June 23, 2008
This was a pick up while at the beach with my family. Well written with characters I easily saw keeping company in the same neighborhood as my granny. The names of the two mothers (Opal and Rose) and the associations one can have to those words added to the expansion of the characters. Alternating 1st person perspective between these two women created a lovely balance as the story built up to the pivotal (and thus transformitive) crisis point. And I am always down with the belief in signs. Good enough read, though not my usual content.
November 28, 2010
This book was quite predictable and unrealistic. Opal is twenty and has a five year old. She leaves her home in North Carolina to get away from her domineering mother. A roll of the dice leads her to Western Massachusetts, to a town called Normal, that seems a lot like Greenfield. The older couple next door lost their only child, a son, five years ago. The wife, Rose, has been pretty much shut down since her son's death, but Opal's arrival wakes her back up again. There is an unexpected plot twist halfway through this book that is unexpected and unfair.
November 14, 2012
MMy idea of a good book is one that awakens the readers emotions which is exactly the effect this book had on me. Opal, a young unwed mother dealing with a meddling mother as well as her child's father fighting for full custody stirred numerous concerns and feelings making this part of the story interesting and very real. This book also deals with the grief a mother deals with after traumatically losing her teenage son and the effects this loss had on her emotional self. Fabulous read!! I highly recommend this book to all.
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