Rebecca Rasmussen’s Evergreen is a haunting, beautifully executed novel set in the 1930s. Eveline and her German husband, Emil, make their home in the remote woods of Minnesota. Their cabin is rough, and they have little contact with other people. With the approach of war, Emil departs for Germany to look after his father, and Eveline stays on at the cabin with their baby, Hux. In Emil’s absence, a stranger comes to the cabin and rapes Eveline, who gets pregnant as a result and gives birth to a daughter, Naamah. Raised in a harsh Catholic orphanage, Naamah endures an unhappy childhood. As adults, she and Hux struggle to come to terms with the past and the harm inflicted on their family. Rasmussen creates memorable characters, including Eveline’s tough-as-nails friend Lulu, who knows how to take care of herself in the wilderness. The novel brings the Minnesota setting to vivid life with a stirring tale that’s as much about place as it is personal relationships and the repercussions of family history. 

ONE LAST TRY
Us, by David Nicholls, is a smart, compassionate novel about the nature of modern marriage and family. Londoners Douglas and Connie Petersen have been contentedly married for almost 20 years. Their 17-year-old son, Albie, has artistic inclinations, which Connie hopes to nurture with a trip to Europe. Before the trip, Connie drops a bomb: She tells Douglas that she may want a divorce—but she isn’t sure. Douglas is devoted to Connie and hopes that the getaway to Europe will revive their romance and bring him closer to temperamental Albie, with whom he has a distant relationship. It’s a pivotal moment in the life of the Petersen family. On their travels, as they tick off the capitals of Europe—Venice, Paris, Amsterdam—Douglas makes some surprising discoveries about himself and what he wants out of life. He’s a likable narrator, intelligent and funny, and the reader can’t help but cheer for him. As he did in the best-selling One Day, Nicholls here offers an appealing, often funny exploration of contemporary coupledom.

TOP PICK FOR BOOK CLUBS
Jane Smiley’s many fans have welcomed the appearance of Some Luck, the first volume in a new family-saga trilogy set in Iowa. Spanning three decades—the 1920s through the 1950s—the book chronicles the lives of Rosanna and Walter Langdon and their five children, with each chapter covering a single year. When the novel opens, Walter has come back from World War I to tend to the family farm, and the reader is treated to an intimate, poignant portrayal of life on the homestead. Each of the Langdon kids grows up to follow a different path—the oldest son, Frank, joins the Army, while reliable Joe remains at home, and the alluring Lillian marries a man who works for the government. The twists and turns of the family’s fortunes make for great reading. Smiley’s characters, as ever, are sharply drawn and authentically alive. This is a richly imagined, compelling work of fiction that will leave readers eager for the next installment.

This article was originally published in the July 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

In his 2009 bestseller One Day, British actor-turned-screenwriter-turned-novelist David Nicholls traced the inevitable romantic collision of star-crossed college acquaintances via snapshots, taken on the same calendar date each year, over their 20-year journey to togetherness. 

In his equally nimble follow-up, Us, Nicholls reverses course to chronicle the gradual disintegration of the 30-year marriage of a well-intentioned if hopelessly mismatched London couple who never quite recovered from the death of their infant firstborn daughter.

"One Day is a very classic will-they-or-won't-they-get-together love story; over 20 years, how do they change and how are they finally drawn to one another and finally make a life together?" Nicholls says from his home in London. "Us is sort of what comes next, I suppose. The questions are: Will they stay together? Do they belong together? Is this going to last? It's not a sequel to One Day in any specific way. It's more of a companion piece, I suppose."

Narrator Douglas Petersen is a buttoned-up, left-brained biochemist who's still baffled that his free-spirited, right-brained artist wife Connie chose to marry him. When Connie wakes him in the middle of the night to suggest that their 30-year marriage may have run its course, the scientist in Douglas cooks up a logical solution: a Grand Tour of the continent's art masterpieces with their moody, artistic teenage son Albie.

In the course of this Griswold-‚ ãesque forced march, Douglas is rescued from a biker beating by a prostitute in Amsterdam, Albie bails to Italy with an accordion-‚ ãplaying female busker, and Connie retreats home, there to hover via smartphone as the determined father fumbles to find and emotionally connect with their wayward son.

Love, loss, laughter and tears are the primary colors to which Nicholls adds subtle shades of wit and wisdom that enable his characters to transcend the page. Little wonder that Us was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize even before it hit U.S. bookshelves.

Nicholls admits he took his own roundabout journey to fiction writing, having spent the better part of the 1990s as a struggling actor, including three years with the Royal National Theater. That apprenticeship morphed into script reading for BBC Radio Drama, script editing for London Weekend Television, script adaptation (Much Ado About Nothing; Tess of the D'Urbervilles) and eventually scriptwriting for TV ("Waiting"; "I Saw You") and film (One Day; Starter for Ten).

"Sadly, I wasn't an accomplished actor at all. I realized it wasn't acting that I enjoyed; it was the characters and stories," he says. "I do regret the fact that I wasted eight years of my life pursuing something that I couldn't do, but I think I learned a lot from it. It was good training."

The breakout success of One Day and the book tour that followed found its way into the comedic framework of Us.

"When One Day came out, I went on something of a grand tour myself, visiting a lot of the cities I'd read about but never seen, and I thought it would be a funny idea to set someone out on that kind of journey, but in middle age," he says. "It also was a chance for me to write about travel, which I love, but not in the hokey glories-of-Venice, splendors-of-Rome way. I wanted to write about it more as it's experienced—the coffee stains, missed trains, bad breath and cheap hotels."

Readers couldn't have asked for a better traveler-without-a-clue than Douglas, whose command of the minutiae of train schedules and hotel check-in times borders on the obsessive. How did a biochemist stumble into this rom-com?

"My novels had always been about the arts, books and TV and films, things I understand. I thought it would be interesting to write about things that I didn't really understand, like science and the visual arts," Nicholls explains. "Douglas doesn't really believe in fiction; he's rather repressed and buttoned-up. There's a key line where he says, ‘I love my wife more than I could say, and so I never said it.' That's sort of what I love about him, the deep well of emotion and passion that lies just beneath the surface."

Nicholls and Douglas do share one memorable moment: the Amsterdam scene in which the scientist accidentally topples a line of expensive motorcycles, nearly sparking a riot. "That happened to me pretty much as written three years ago," Nicholls chuckles. "I managed to escape, but it was pretty horrific."

If One Day explored the adage that opposites attract, Us tests its staying power.

"Douglas and Connie's marriage is a bit like a lot of relationships: the differences initially intrigue you. It's only when children become involved that the different attitudes you have and different outlooks on life can become a problem," Nicholls says.

Speaking of problems, how does one craft a happy ending to a marriage falling apart?

"That's a tricky one," he admits. "I still think of Us as a love story; it has a lot in it that's romantic. But it's probably a little more grown up, a little darker, a little more ambiguous, and I think that all of those things are good. Hopefully, in the same way that people saw themselves in One Day, they will see themselves in Us."

"Hopefully, in the same way that people saw themselves in One Day, they will see themselves in Us."

The film adaptation of One Day opened shortly after the book's publication, with Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess starring in Nicholls' screenplay—but the author has other plans for Us.

"I really want it to have a proper life as a book first. Also, I think it's a very, very hard book to adapt, which is why I won't adapt it. Someone else will have to take it on."

 

This article was originally published in the November 2014 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Douglas Petersen is a biochemist. His wife, Connie, an artist (though nonpracticing) and arts administrator, in bed at 4 a.m., tells him that after 24 years of marriage she is thinking of leaving him. The often maddeningly practical, reliable, and methodical Douglas is, understandably, shaken, as his devotion to Connie is beyond question. The family was to embark on a Grand Tour of Europe this summer; their 17-year-old son, Albie, is starting college in the fall. Connie feels they should all go anyway. Douglas, ever the scientist, hopes that through careful preparation (and lots of Wikipedia) the trip will bring structure to his son and help remind his wife of the wonderful life they share. Yet an altercation with a guest in their Amsterdam hotel sends Albie off on his own, with Douglas in hot pursuit. VERDICT Nicholls (One Day) has created in Douglas a man who has always known where he was and where he was going and who now is suddenly adrift emotionally as well as physically. And all the guidebooks and online tours won't be enough to right his course. Are you thinking this is a predictable tale of family dynamics? Think again; this is Nicholls, after all. For those who loved One Day, the author's latest is another heart-grabber about discovering what makes us happy and learning to let go. [See Prepub Alert, 5/12/14; see also "Editors' Fall Picks," LJ 9/1/14, p. 28.]—Bette-Lee Fox, Library Journal

Nicholls hit it big with One Day, which has sold over two million copies in 37 languages—and nearly 400,000 copies before the release of the 2011 film starring Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess. His new work features gently unassuming scientist Douglas Petersen, whose wife of nearly three decades announces that she wants a divorce—just as they're about to take son Albie on a big trip to Europe. A hopeful Douglas schemes to use the trip as a means of saving his marriage. BEA and book club promotion; a 500,000-copy first printing.

In Nicholls's (One Day) latest novel, Connie Peterson wakes her husband Douglas in the middle of the night to tell him she may want to end their marriage. The family already has a European trip planned, the last before their son, Albie, leaves their London suburb for college, and Douglas, ever the scientist, hatches a plan to change Connie's mind: he will ensure their trip becomes an exemplar of the happy family they can be. Working against Douglas is the fact that he and his son have suffered a strained relationship from birth, and that Connie, an artist at heart, believes an organic vacation—one that evolves from the whims of any given day—would be a great improvement over Douglas's strict, pedantic itineraries. Douglas is an amiably bumbling narrator, and Nicholls convincingly infuses his protagonist's voice with the dry wit and charm that have served the author so well in his previous books. This is Nicholls's most ambitious work to date, and his realistically flawed characters are somehow endearing despite the many bruises they inflict upon each other. (Oct.)

In Nicholls's (One Day) latest novel, Connie Peterson wakes her husband Douglas in the middle of the night to tell him she may want to end their marriage. The family already has a European trip planned, the last before their son, Albie, leaves their London suburb for college, and Douglas, ever the scientist, hatches a plan to change Connie's mind: he will ensure their trip becomes an exemplar of the happy family they can be. Working against Douglas is the fact that he and his son have suffered a strained relationship from birth, and that Connie, an artist at heart, believes an organic vacation—one that evolves from the whims of any given day—would be a great improvement over Douglas's strict, pedantic itineraries. Douglas is an amiably bumbling narrator, and Nicholls convincingly infuses his protagonist's voice with the dry wit and charm that have served the author so well in his previous books. This is Nicholls's most ambitious work to date, and his realistically flawed characters are somehow endearing despite the many bruises they inflict upon each other. (Oct.)