Monday, August 26, 2013

Out of the Easy by Ruta Sepetys



I loved this book.  I'm just going to say that right out front.  The writing is fantastic.  The characters are well developed and interesting.  The characters, the setting, the whole book just continues to stay with me two days after I finished it.

Sepetys writes another great historical fiction.  This time she moves from 1940's Europe (Between Shades of Gray)  to 1950's New Orleans.  She sets up the story nicely with a wonderfully described setting.  I honestly felt like I was walking the streets of New Orleans with the characters. Josie Moraine is the daughter of a prostitute and an unknown father.  Her mother moves them from Detroit it 1940 to return to her work in a brothel.  Josie's mother is not a nice woman.  There is no implication that all women who work as prostitutes are terrible people.  In fact, most of the women described that work in this brothel, are caring, unique individuals who just happen to be prostitutes by trade.  Josie's mother is not a sympathetic person in the least and you do get frustrated with Josie for still caring for her mother like she does, but she is her mother after all and she's somewhat of a minor character in the story of Josie.

Josie hasn't lived with her mother for about 6 years.  Instead, she lives upstairs of the bookstore where she works in exchange for rent.  She also works cleaning up the brothel where her mother works, saving all her money to get the heck out of this town.  She wants nothing more than to escape New Orleans and head to college out East.  A difficulty with little money and her unseemly background.

The story that unfolds is about Josie, the people in her life and the town of New Orleans.  It can't really be defined as a mystery, thriller, romance, or historical fiction.  It is all of those things.  It's about a girl discovering who she is, where she came from and what it all means.  The characters fill up the pages.  It is much like sitting down and watching a movie.  I enjoyed this book so much.  I highly recommend it.

You can find Out of the Easy by Ruta Sepetys in our new YA section.  For more information on this book, check out: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11178225-out-of-the-easy

Liz

No comments:

Post a Comment