Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout
In a follow-up to “Olive Kitteridge,” a Pulitzer Prize
winner, the overbearing, judgmental math teacher is a widow. For years she was married
to Henry, a well-liked and patient man, a pharmacist in the small town of
Crosby, Maine. They had one son, Christopher, who clashed with his mother.
Henry had a stroke and died years later.
In “Olive, Again,” the reader is surprised that Olive has
remarried. Who would want to spend time with Olive on purpose? Jack is a
retired Harvard professor who left under a cloud. Olive tries to get along with
her son and his family, she delivers a baby in a parked car, and deals with
Jack’s problems and her own.
Olive is infuriating but
is dealing with universal problems of health, death, family problems, and
friends and neighbors. While may have irritated much of the town, she is not to
be forgotten.
