| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details
|
More About the Author
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organise and find favourite items. |
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Two years ago, I read Patricia Gaffney's The Saving Graces while on vacaton at the shore. It ended up being the best book I read that entire summer. When I saw that this author had a new book coming out for this summer, I bought it immediately with the intention of saving it for my vacation in the hope that I'd, once again, find another summer favorite in Gaffney's new offering. Unfortunately, this was not to be the case. Even though Lavyrle Spencer has retired, I had the feeling that I was reading one of her stories -- albeit a very poor rendition of one.
The setting is the Eastern Shore of Maryland but the reader never really gets the feeling that they are anywhere near the water, even though one of the characters lives on a boat. Anna Fiore has returned to her childhood home to help her Aunt Rose bring some life back into the failing family restaurant. This would all be well and good except for the fact that Anna really doesn't want to be there (or so she says) and fights her aunt and friends constantly by continually making sure they understand this is a "temporary" arrangement. By this time, I was wishing that Anna would leave already instead of waiting around while everyone begs her to stay. The reader will learn why she is so antagonistic towards her aunt and what the grudge is that she still holds against her -- some twenty years later.
I've often been involved in discussions as to whether one can truly enjoy a book if they can't stand the characters. I find this very hard to do and this book is a perfect example of my contention. It is filled with surly, self-serving, phobia filled, sickly, beseeching and bad-tempered individuals who supposedly will all come together in a common goal. If the saying that "opposites attract" is true, then this book is right on target with its character development even though the combinations stretch one's imagination to the limit at times.
My last criticism is in the title and the cover. I feel that this cover, of a white picket fence set in the sand dunes, is meant to give summer readers that "beachy" feeling they are looking for. It's deceptive because it is not a "beachy" feeling kind of book. And, what's up with the title FLIGHT LESSONS?? -- it's really not indicative at all of the story. The proper cover should have been that of a restaurant and the title perhaps "Cooking Lessons" but that might have been too boring (like this book). Well, whatever lesson was to be learned, I must have missed it.
This three star rating, by the way, is on the low end of the scale almost leaning towards two stars.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
17 reviews
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful
The Prodigal daughter
29 July 2002
Format:Hardcover
The Oscar Wilde quote, "After a good dinner, one can forgive anybody, even one's own relations" that Patrica Gaffney prefaces her book with, is an accurate description of the issues she explores in Flight Lessons. In a twist to the biblical prodigal son, Anna returns to her hometown on the Chesapeake bay at the age of 36 and after a disasterous end to a romantic relationship. Anna is a complex, and often quite exasperating character. She is balanced in the book by her aunt Rose, now 60 and the owner of a faltering Italian restaurant. Anna is welcomed home and agrees to manage the restaurant for the summer but is not ready to forgive and forget the family issues that caused her to leave. Rose is a more appealing character, particularly in regard to her relationship with Theo, a crusty Bay waterman, now sidelined with a degenerative disease. All of the characters are finely drawn, Frankie, the talented but troubled new chef at the restaurant, Eddie, the handsome but unreliable bartender and Carmen,the unmarried, overweight long time chef who is resentful of the new chef and the changes Anna wants to make to save the restaurant.The close up look at running a small family restaurant was particularly interesting and the bits of information about birds and bird photography, the avocation of Mason, another character were engrossing. (I will now try to catch a bird yawnings, soemthing I never knew they did) More than a love story, the book is honest and insightful as it explore the complicated dynamics of family and the ways individuals address their own family history. Anna's apparent dysfunction and inabilty to sustain relationships seems as much due to her own unforgiving nature as the tough issues she dealt with as a child and young woman. Our desire to paint family members as either black or white, good or bad is illuminated as Anna addresses her memories of her mother and father as well as Rose. More than a good summer read, the book has enough interest to make your reading list in any season.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
wonderful relationship drama
11 Aug 2002
Format:Hardcover
In icy upstate New York, Anna Catalano ends her affair with her lover when she catches him with her boss in her bed just after she had outpatient laparascopy. When her Aunt Iris offers her the job of manager of Bella Sorella, Anna decides to accept on a temporary basis though she rarely has gone home to the Maryland Eastern Shore. Anna's Aunt Rose, whom she caught in bed with her father while her mother was dying from ovarian cancer, owns the restaurant. The aunt and the niece are banally civil, but truly communicate through Iris.
Restaurant management proves difficult, but Anna handles it with aplomb. However, she has more trouble coping with her feelings towards photographer Mason Winograd, as she does not trust relationships. More complex and harder on Anna's soul is Rose wants a reconciliation with her beloved niece and will do whatever it takes to succeed.
FLIGHT LESSONS is a wonderful relationship drama that is at its best when the women take center stage without any males in their way though the men are well written characters. The story line engages the reader by looking at the impact a long-term squabble has on individuals. The Rose-Anna situation is cleverly written so that many readers will recognize similar relationships with family members. However, the romance between Anna and Mason never leaves the ground, as it seems pale next to that of the women. Patricia Gaffney provides a strong character driven sequel to her best selling THE SAVING GRACES.
Harriet Klausner
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Very enjoyable drama
18 April 2005
Format:Mass Market Paperback
I really liked "Saving Graces" by the same author, although it did make me sad at times (when it was supposed to).
I just finished "Flight Lessons", and I really liked it. It's about coming home, looking back, and moving forward. Anna and Rose are both people you'd like to be friends with, I think, and I could understand both of their motives, their reasons. The background type characters, like Frankie and Carmen, Theo and Mason, make you care about them too.
I actually put off reading my new Mary Higgins Clark novel, as well as Judith Michael's latest, two of my favorite authors, to read this one.
I'll be adding Patricia Gaffney to my list of authors to explore more.
I just finished "Flight Lessons", and I really liked it. It's about coming home, looking back, and moving forward. Anna and Rose are both people you'd like to be friends with, I think, and I could understand both of their motives, their reasons. The background type characters, like Frankie and Carmen, Theo and Mason, make you care about them too.
I actually put off reading my new Mary Higgins Clark novel, as well as Judith Michael's latest, two of my favorite authors, to read this one.
I'll be adding Patricia Gaffney to my list of authors to explore more.
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
