Laura Munson

Sometimes sad and honest are synonymous and Willa’s Grove is both. Upon the sudden death of her husband, Willa Sylvester is faced with the reality that she will have to sell her husband’s dream, the town he named after his beloved wife: Willa, Montana.

Thirty-five people reside in Willa, Montana, and Jack and Willa employed, assisted, housed, or otherwise cared for each one of them. Once Jack passed, Willa’s grief holed her up in their home and away from their friends, the residents of Willa. Months later, after crawling out of her grief enough to come up for air, Willa learns Jack’s secret: They are broke. There is no money.

At the behest of her oldest friend, Bliss, Willa invites three women, a friend of a friend situation, to join her for the final week before the auction that will sell the town of Willa, Montana. The women converge on Willa’s home and learn the intricacies and beauty of wilderness, Montana, and being a middle-aged woman. And each carry their demons of their mid-life with them, hoping to find resolution.

Bliss: desperately wants a child but has recently been abandoned by her husband. Harriette has fallen from the public’s grace as a motivational personality and is living as a hermit, and Jane has it all, doting husband, four perfect children, wealth, community, society, and a lover. She will have to figure out what makes her happy: family or freedom.

Willa’s Grove is difficult to read in that it is a story about real life, the actual raw realism that befalls women of a certain age - we have lost ourselves to the “supposed to” of life. This was supposed to have happened, or that was supposed to have worked out, or he was supposed to have been with me to the end, or my children or career were supposed to have fulfilled me.

There were times reading this where I wondered why am I still reading? It would have been easier on me to have DNF’d this one, but then I would have missed out on the community of the book, the “I am not alone” feelings, the “It’s okay to just be and be where I am” understanding that came with finishing the book.

Beautifully written, I feel that Willa’s Grove will fly under the radar because of its difficult storyline, but the storyline is exactly why it needs to be read.

I want to give this book a 4/5 because it made me uncomfortable, and for that reason alone I realize it is a solid 5/5. We need to read (and do) more uncomfortable things.
… (altro)

Montana is the star of Laura Munson’s Willa’s Grove, a beautiful place, beautifully depicted, with tiny towns so small one might even be for sale—but what happens to people when their town is sold.

The novel’s costars are four women who, like the town of Willa, are wondering where they go “from here.” Each for different reasons feels lost and betrayed by life and friends. And each has arrived at the rambling farmhouse, as much on a whim as in reply to invitation. But a town needs relationships as surely as people do, as surely as crops need farming and animals need care. And just as surely, all can be wild as well.

Willa’s Grove balances wild and tame in human nature and in nature, blending folksy wisdom with fascinating backstories and captivating drama. While none of the characters is immediately relatable, they all prove well worth knowing in their own rights, and they, together with town and country, plus a warm touch of faith hope and love, carry the story on.

The novel is neither self-help nor spiritual, neither romantic nor unromantic, neither traditional nor avant-garde. It’s just a good, surprisingly positive, absorbing women’s read, reminding me, oddly, of The Women’s Room, which I read way way back in college.

Disclosure: I was give a copy and I freely offer my honest review.… (altro)

Willa's Grove by Laura Munson is a recommended feel-good women's novel featuring four very different women at a cross road in their lives.

It all started with an invitation from one woman sent to three different women that invited them to the rest of their lives by visiting a lodge at a homestead in Montana for one week. Each of the four women have found themselves at a juncture in their lives where they are entering middle age with uncertain or unexpected futures. The invitations have been sent by Willa Silvester, a recent widow who must say goodbye to her home and town because she can no longer afford to stay there.

Willa's friend, Bliss, is facing her own world of hurt in Wisconsin. When the two talk they plan the weekend where a friend invites a friend who then invites a friend. Bliss invites Harriet, a former motivational speaker living in California. Harriet invites Jane, a highly guarded and proper socialite from the east coast. The three very different women are going to spend the week honestly examining their lives and their futures while helping Willa pack and say good-bye to her town.

The premise is that these extremely different friends of friends will be able to bond together and create a community of mutual support because they are all women. There are parts of this novel that are touching in the honest and open discussion the women have about their lives and what they wanted versus what they have. (Let's just fess up and say that nothing political or controversial, with one exception, was ever discussed between the women.) And while it is true that we all need friends we can be open and honest with, the expectation that you will find that connection because you are all women is unrealistic. There is also something to be said about connecting with people who you have a natural affinity toward and share similarities in beliefs and background.

In the end, Willa's Grove is a feel-good women's novel set in Montana. And it must be said that the setting is as important as the characters. This is a novel to read when you want to pass the time quietly. There is nothing shocking or surprising that happens. (There is one incident that simple could not happen as described, but I don't want to give a spoiler.)

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of Blackstone Publishing.
http://www.shetreadssoftly.com/2020/02/willas-grove.html… (altro)