A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler
The Whitshanks, Abby and Red and their four grown children, are a close knit Baltimore family driving (mostly) merrily along the road of middle class happiness. However, when a domestic crisis brings an extended visit by the “black sheep” of the family, the wheels come spiraling off the bus.
In less capable hands, this would be rather conventional domestic tale, but Tyler is better than that. The Whitshanks may not be exactly like your family, but you’ll recognize every character.
WHAT OTHER REVIEWERS SAY
The Boston Globe: “Tyler’s characters are thoroughly three-dimensional. They are our own families; they are ourselves; and it is our own desperate desire to understand the people we love, as well as the people who hurt us and whom we hurt, that keeps us reading with fervor.”
WHO WROTE IT
Anne Tyler is the author of twenty novels including Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant, The Accidental Tourist, and Breathing Lessons, which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1988.
Category: Fiction