WWW.WEDNESDAY

This meme is no more. And yet I persist in answering the three questions it asked each week. Stubborn, ain't I?

1. What are you currently reading? Remember Me Like This by Bret Anthony Johnston. Just started it and all I can say is, "Wow." Everything about it is unique and memorable.

•  The premise: What happens to a family if they get their wish and abducted kid is recovered and returned to them? Yes, one of those "Have You Seen Me?" milk carton kids -- an 11-year-old boy -- is found four years later. What is that like? The questions … The scrutiny … The trial and punishment of the kidnapper … The seismic shift in family dynamics … all of it is explored.

•  The characters. Each of the five central family members -- the boy, his parents, his brother and his grandfather -- is uniquely and skillfully drawn.

•  The prose. Mr. Johnston turns a beautiful phrase. It's a pleasure to read, even if the story is intense.

2. What did you recently finish reading? Wake by Anna Hope. Another emotionally intense story by another talented first-time novelist. This is about three women living in London and dealing with the aftermath of "the war," aka WWI. But that's the thing of it. We know what they do not -- that while they put their shattered lives back together as best they can in the 1920s, it will all come apart again too soon when WWII breaks out and hits much closer to home.

 

 3.  What will you read next? I can't wait to return to  Frank: The Voice by James Kaplan. I started reading this book as my own way of celebrating Sinatra's centennial (he would turn 100 this September). I had no idea I'd enjoy it as much as I am.

 

What an artist. What a rascal. Kaplan writes well and pays attention to both Frank's auspicious talent and his audacious life. It's just it's 800 pages long, and I wanted to take a break and read something else before going back to it.

And I shall. This accounting of Sinatra's life is too entertaining and too uniquely American for me not to finish it.