By Elizabeth Strout – <\/b>Random House, 2019<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
Welcome back, Olive Kitteridge! It\u2019s been over a decade since Elizabeth Strout introduced us to the most incorrigible resident of Crosby, Maine. <\/span>Olive Kitteridge<\/span><\/i> (2008) won the Pulitzer Prize, became a <\/span>New York Times<\/span><\/i> bestseller and was later adapted for an HBO miniseries. Yet Strout tells the <\/span>New Yorker<\/span><\/i> that she <\/span>never intended to bring Olive back<\/span>, saying she believed, \u201c<\/span>I was done with her, and she with me.\u201d We are so glad that didn\u2019t stick. <\/span><\/p>\n We rejoin Olive at age 73. She\u2019s widowed now, lonely but still acerbic and off-putting to those she encounters. She finds neighbor Jack Kennison\u2014a retired professor she and her husband felt was entitled and arrogant\u2014incapacitated on a path, helps him up and learns they are both widowed and are somewhat estranged from their only children. Soon, Olive and Jack are married, and neither of their adult children understands it. And so it goes, each chapter a vignette that reveals Olive evolving. In some ways so dreadful, Olive becomes a woman we believe redeemable. She holds onto old ideas but starts to make room for the possibility there could be another way to see the truth. It\u2019s inspiring to see the retired teacher become the student, and empathy takes hold of her, if transiently. Gradually, she becomes the person we hope to be in later life when confronted with the grow-or-die circumstances life throws at us. You don\u2019t have to read the original <\/span>Olive Kitteridge<\/span><\/i> to enjoy <\/span>Olive, Again<\/span><\/i>, but I think you\u2019ll want to. We\u2019re so glad Strout brought Olive back and we join the fans hoping for a prequel: Olive, Before?<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Welcome back, Olive Kitteridge! It\u2019s been over a decade since Elizabeth Strout introduced us to the most incorrigible resident of Crosby, Maine. <\/span><\/p>\n