Book Pick: We Are Water

I've read all of Wally Lamb's books and by now I'm starting to see some characters, situations and ideas that seem to repeat:

~some sort of mental illness that requires hospitalization or at least some sessions on a couch
~relatives from Italy
~relatives, ethnicity or maybe even a trip to Greece
~experimentation or confusion about sexual preference
~twins
~an extremely intelligent and sensitive man who sometimes makes bad choices
~a tough but vulnerable woman with a very secretive past
~a national or local tragic event that is well-remembered
~Connecticut

Some might think that a return to well-worn topics is a bit trite, but I say, write what you know! And boy does he ever!

This book was so wrenching in places that I didn't want to put it down mainly because I wanted to just get through how difficult it was. But that's actually something I dig about some books. When you finish them, you feel like you've been through something and then there's growth.

As I was reading, I kept thinking the characters remind me of someone.....who? Then I realized Annie Oh is a lot like Delores Price from She's Come Undone and Orion Oh could be Dominick Birdsey from I Know This Much is True. Or maybe even Caelum Quirk from The Hour I First Believed. It's like seeing old friends reincarnated into the next life!

A beautiful book. Timely. Thought-provoking. Everything I love and expect from Wally Lamb.

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