All the Best People

All the Best People by Sonja Yoerg Summary:  An intricately crafted story of madness, magic and misfortune across three generations from the author of The Middle of Somewhere and House Broken... Vermont, 1972. Carole LaPorte has a satisfying, ordinary life. She cares for her children, balances the books for the family’s auto shop and laughs when her husband slow dances her across the kitchen floor. Her tragic childhood might have happened to someone else. But now her mind is playing tricks on her. The accounts won’t reconcile and the murmuring she hears isn’t the television. She ought to seek help, but she’s terrified of being locked away in a mental hospital like her mother, Solange. So Carole hides her symptoms, withdraws from her family and unwittingly sets her eleven-year-old daughter Alison on a desperate search for meaning and power: in Tarot cards, in omens from a nearby river and in a mysterious blue glass box belonging to her grandmother. An exploration of the power of courage and love to overcome a damning legacy, All the Best People celebrates the search for identity and grace in the most ordinary lives. Angie’s comments: A moving look at family and mental illness. You see how the family members dealt and continue to deal with mental illness, and the toll the secrecy and the illness takes on each character. I just wanted to hug Alison throughout the book. Recommended for readers of deeply moving family drama. Request this item Request this item in large print