by Susan Roberts
I’m headed to Michigan in May for a week at a cottage on Lake Michigan. I was born in Detroit, and the Lake Michigan shoreline is my happy place. I spent all of my summers up there growing up, and I try to get back there at least once a year. Like a lot of other readers, I travel means picking out appropriate books to take along. Here are some great books that are set in Michigan that I plan to pack.
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Books that are Set in the Upper Peninsula:
The Marsh King's Daughter by Karen Dionne
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| April 2018; G.P. Putnam's Sons; 978-0735213012 audio, ebook, print (352 pages); mystery |
"If I told you my mother's name, you'd recognize it right away. My mother was famous, though she never wanted to be. Hers wasn't the kind of fame anyone would wish for. Jaycee Dugard, Amanda Berry, Elizabeth Smart - that kind of thing, though my mother was none of them.
You'd recognize my mother's name if I told it to you, and then you'd wonder - briefly, because the years when people cared about my mother are long gone, as she is - where is she now? And didn't she have a daughter while she was missing? And whatever happened to that little girl?
"I was born two years into my Mother’s captivity. She was three weeks shy of seventeen. If I had known then, what I do now, things would have been a lot different. I wouldn’t have adored my Father.” (p1)
This fantastic novel takes place in a remote cabin in the marshlands of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. If it seems strange to the reader that anywhere can be as remote as this cabin was, let me assure you that there are still areas like this in Michigan's UP where a person could hide for years. This book grabbed me on the first page and kept me enthralled until the end. It was interesting to see how the attitudes of the main character towards her parents changed throughout the book as she grew up and became a mother too.
The story is told by Helena as an adult with a lot of flashbacks to her younger years. She didn't realize it until she was 14, but her mother had been kidnapped by her father at age 14 and held captive in a remote area of northern Michigan. Helena worshiped her father when she was growing up - she hunted and fished with him and spent most of her waking hours with him. She had him on a high pedestal. She also mirrored her father's negative opinion of her mother and didn't have much regard for her mother when she was growing up. The hero-worship of her father in her younger years could have been difficult to understand, but Helena didn't know any better; she didn't realize that their lives were any different from those of other people because she never saw anyone but her parents as she was growing up. Twenty years after she and her mother escaped and her father went to prison, she has buried her past and kept it a secret even from her husband. When her father escapes from prison, she knows that she is the only person who can find him before he inflicts harm on other people.
The way that the story is told, with Helena's search for her father as an adult and flashbacks to her childhood in the marsh, helps to make this novel very suspenseful. Helena is a well-written main character who changes throughout the novel. The setting is beautiful, even though the circumstances are horrific. This is a beautifully written, suspenseful novel with a main character that I won't soon forget.
Buy The Marsh King's Daughter at Amazon
The Women of the Copper Country by Mary Doria Russell
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| July 2020; Atria Books; 978-1982109592 audio, ebook, print (368 pages); biographical fiction |
"A good day in the mine is a day when nobody gets killed or crippled. Or if somebody does, at least it's not you. At the end of a shift, if you're lucky - still alive, still on your feet - you trudge back through tunnels that seem a lot longer than they did thirteen hours ago and you climb back up those cut-stone stairs on rubbery legs. Everything hurts. ...Without knowing, you've been scared all day and you're tired, tired, tired. Filthy, but almost too tired to clean up. Hungry, but almost too tired to eat." (p 116)
This novel takes place in Calumet, Michigan, in 1913. At this time, Calumet had the largest and most profitable copper mines in the US. Workers risked their lives every day underground with frequent deaths and injuries. The workers rent their homes from the company, shop in the company store, and even have to buy their own gloves and shovels to work with. As the working population of the mines lives a meager existence, the stockholders and mine managers are living the high life - trips to Europe, large homes, and sumptuous food. They feel like they are doing the workers, many of them immigrants, a favor by providing them a place to work. It's no wonder that the promise of the unions has gained popularity with the workers.
The true-life main character is Annie Clements. She has seen how her family and friends struggle and knows that unionizing is the only way to provide a future. She is very charismatic and has the support of the wives and daughters of the workers when she encourages a strike. Some of the men strike while others continue to work. As the strike continues, Annie is affecting the miners’ fortunes and health and her own reputation as she faces the threat of prison for leading the strike. On her fierce quest for justice, Annie will discover just how much she is willing to sacrifice for her own independence and the families of Calumet.
This is an emotional novel about the workers who struggled with mistreatment by the rich owners and the people's involvement in the early labor movement in US workplaces. The strikes caused violence and upset in the strikers' lives as they had to decide whether to continue their strike or give in to the owner's demands.
Annie Clements was a real person who led the strike at the copper mines in the years before WWI. She was a real inspiration who only wanted the betterment of the working conditions to help families. "What the union wants is simple. Eight hours for work. Eight hours for sleep. Eight hours for families to be together."
Buy The Women of the Copper Country at Amazon
Books that are Set in the Detroit Area
The Turner House by Angela Flournoy
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| March 2016; Mariner Books; 978-0544705166 audio, ebook, print (352 pages); historical fiction |
The Turner House is Angela Flournoy's first novel, and it shows incredible talent for a first novel - I can only imagine where she will go from here. I look forward to following her writing career. The Turner House is about a home on the east side of Detroit that was lived in by Francis and Viola Turner and their 13 children. Francis has died (though we meet him through flashbacks), and Viola is living with her oldest son, Cha-Cha, due to her health. Due to the economic crisis in Detroit, more is owed on the house than it can be sold for, and the family needs to decide what to do about it. Even though there are a lot of characters in the book, the author mainly concentrates on the parents, Cha-Cha, and the youngest child, Lelah. This is a family full of arguments and dissension, but it's also a family full of love and laughter and memories. I really enjoyed this book and would love to read about this family again in another book. I highly recommend it!
Buy The Turner House at Amazon
Beautiful Music by Michael Zadoorian
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| May 2018; Akashic Books; 978-1617756276 audio, ebook, priint (336 pages); literary fiction |
Every once in a while, a book comes along that makes you happy as you read it. This new novel by Michael Zadoorian was that book for me. It's a fantastically written coming-of-age story by the author of The Leisure Seeker, but it's also a book full of musical references, and it took my memory back to happy times in my youth when I listened to the same music. An added plus for me is that the book takes place in Detroit, where I grew up, and there were numerous references to people and places that I have forgotten over the years. Even if you aren't from Detroit, Beautiful Music is still a fantastic book that needs to be added to your to-be-read list.
Beautiful Music is set in Detroit in the early 70s, several years after the Detroit riots, as the city is still trying to deal with racial unrest. Danny is just getting ready to start high school and is very nervous about it. He is a loner, often picked on, and hides in music to handle high school and his very dysfunctional family. After Danny's dad dies unexpectedly, his mom becomes hooked on alcohol and Valium, and his family life is only held together because he takes care of his mom. When he was young, he started out listening to pop music with lots of orchestra music with his dad. As he gets older, he discovers rock and roll, and the music is what he lives for. When he is buried in his music, he can forget the world around him. It also helps him make friends and grow into a normal high school student.
Back in that time, radio and record albums were the only way to listen to music. DJs on the radio were superstars, and everyone listened to what they had to say - they could make or break the popularity of a record album.
This is a wonderful, nostalgic coming-of-age story - with the help of lots of music, and for readers of a certain age, it will bring back plenty of memories. I highly recommend this book to all ages!
Buy Beautiful Music at Amazon
Books Set on the Lake Michigan shoreline
The Edge of Summer by Viola Shipman
Viola Shipman has only been publishing novels for 6 years. I read his first book because it was set in Michigan on the Lake Michigan shoreline, but soon found out that not only was it a great setting, but it was also a fantastic book. Since then, I've read every book that he's written and have loved them all. He always writes believable characters in beautiful settings, and his plots always make it difficult to put the book down before the end. He's now been added to my list of authors that are auto-buys. I don't need to know what the book is about before I pre-order it.
Sutton grew up with her mom in the Ozarks. It was always just the two of them because her mom always told her that her family had all died in a fire. The older Sutton got, the more she wanted to know who her family was, but her mother never said a word about them. When she dies, she leaves a letter to Sutton, and after reading it, she decides that the answer to her questions about family may be found in Michigan at a resort town named Douglas near Saugatuck on the Lake Michigan shoreline. Her mom had always had button boxes in the house, and Sutton spent a lot of time organizing them and making necklaces when she was growing up. She rented a small cottage in Douglas and started to ask questions about her mom. When she goes to an estate sale near her rented cottage, she buys a collection of buttons from Bonnie, the owner of the huge house near hers. She and Bonnie begin to spend some time together, and Sutton begins to wonder if Bonnie might be her grandmother. After she finds out that her mother grew up in Douglas, she begins to ask Bonnie and some of the old-timers in town about her mother. The more she learns about her mother and her mother's family, the more questions she has. Will Sutton ever find out about her family, or are the secrets buried too deep in this small resort town? Once she finds out, will she go back to Chicago, the Ozarks, or will she stay in Michigan?
This is a great story about family - known and unknown, friends, love, and secrets, and how they can affect people in later generations. It's not only a story about finding a family with blood ties - you can also create a family consisting of people you love and spend time with.
Pack a bag and take a trip to one of the loveliest places in the world -- the Lake Michigan shoreline. If you can't make the trip, pick up a Viola Shipmen book and take a mental vacation.
Buy The Edge of Summer at Amazon
The Heirloom Garden by Viola Shipman
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| April 2020; Graydon House; 978-1525804618 audio, ebook, print (448 pages); women's fiction |
The Heirloom Garden is another fantastic book by Viola Shipman. I started it as soon as it showed up in my mailbox, even though I had a stack of books that should have been read first, but this is one of my 'go-to' authors, and I had to read it right away. I am a huge fan of books about Michigan, and books that take place on Lake Michigan always tug at my heart because of all the summers that I spent at the Lake growing up. This author describes the area around Lake Michigan so well and so beautifully that it is an integral part of the story, as important as the characters. I loved this book.
The story is told in dual timelines and in different eras.
1944 - Iris lost her husband in WWII, and her daughter not too long after that. Her grief caused her to put walls up around her house and around her heart. She doesn't have anything to do with the people in town, has her groceries and garden supplies delivered, and is only really alive when she is spending time in her beloved gardens. In her gardens, she re-lives her memories of her grandmother, her mother, her husband, and her daughter -- the garden becomes her only family.
2003 - Abby, her husband, and their daughter, Lily, move from the Detroit area to Grand Haven for Abby to take a new job. They rent the house next door to Iris (which Iris still owns), but the high fences let them know that Iris has no desire for company or friendly neighbors. Abby is trying to handle everything - her husband has PTSD and is unable to contribute to the family either emotionally or monetarily. Instead, he mostly sleeps, drinks, and re-lives his memories of war. Lily tries to make the best of things, but she is lonely and nervous about starting at a new school with no friends.
Both of these households are in a bad place - Iris misses her long-gone family, and Abby misses the husband that she had before he went to war. The two families are slowly drawn together at first through their love for flowers and then through the help that they can both bring to each other. Even though the two women are separated by a generation, they are both equally scarred by war but manage to find love and friendship through their gardens of flowers.
I loved the way that the author set up this book. Each new chapter is named after a different flower - lilacs, bleeding heart, daisies, etc., and then gives more insight into each family. I love flowers and enjoyed the way that the story was so intermingled with flower images. The characters are so well written that I feel like I know them, and the Lake Michigan setting is so well described that I feel like I'd gone on a mini-vacation.
Buy The Heirloom Garden at Amazon
Non-Fiction
The Gales of November by John U. Bacon
On November 10, 1975, the Edmund Fitzgerald, the biggest, best, and most profitable ship on the Great Lakes, sank in Lake Superior during the 'storm of the century'. Facing 100-mile-per-hour winds and 50-foot waves on Lake Superior, the Mighty Fitz found itself at the worst possible place, at the worst possible time. When she sank, she took all 29 men on board down with her.
This book was a mixture of the history of shipping on the Great Lakes and background about the crew, much of it told by friends and family. I knew a bit about the Edmund Fitzgerald, but not that when it went down, it was the best-made ship on the water with a well-seasoned captain who was admired by all. There was a lot of information about the history of shipping as well as the building of the Fitzgerald. These boats were crucial to the early auto production in Detroit as well as other cities. I found that part of the book interesting, but to me, the best part of the book was the information about the crew and what their jobs were on the ship. There were several men interviewed who made last-minute decisions not to go on that final voyage, and sad stories about many - the captain who planned to retire after this one last voyage, and other men who had just started working the ship. His research was so good that I felt like I knew some of these men and, yes, I shed a few tears at their loss.
Many people who live near the Great Lakes remember the storm and remember where they were when they first heard about the loss of the Edmund Fitzgerald. Others have only heard about it from the wonderful song written and sung by Gordon Lightfoot (The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald). Others know nothing about it. No matter which category you fall into, this is a book that you don't want to miss. The author has done extensive research and makes the story come alive with his descriptions of the crew and the captain who went down with the ship. I don't read a lot of nonfiction because I find it pretty dry, but this book was a real page turner, especially during the ship's final hours as the author re-created what must have been going on in the ship during the high winds and 50-foot waves. The Gales of November is an emotional tribute to the lives lost and a propulsive, page-turning history of the loss of this great ship and its crew.
Buy The Gales of November at Amazon
Susan Roberts grew up in Michigan but loves the laid-back life at her home in the Piedmont area of North Carolina where she is three hours from the beach to the east and the mountains in the west. She reads almost anything but her favorite genres are Southern Fiction and Historical Fiction.
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