FIN & LADY by Cathleen Schine narrated by Anne Twomey from MacMillan Audio is my second Schine read. It is another exploration of family through sibling relationships. I thought Twomey’s narration was excellent and I was able to do each character justice with her voice.
Fin & Lady are brother and sister separated by just over a decade they share the same father. They did not know each other before Fin came to live with Lady following the death of his parents. Although, Fin always remembers their brief encounter from when he was a young boy. I will not share the origins of their names as that is just one of the interesting parts details that Schine delivers in FIN & LADY.
While Lady is the older of the two she does not always act as if she is. And many times it is Fin that takes control and care of Lady. He is a young boy beyond his years. Although, you wonder if it is because of the situation he finds himself in or would he always have been this way even if his parents had not passed away.
Lady’s life is definitely not suited for a child and even though one would think she might have made some adjustments for Fin it was he that had to adjust to Lady’s lifestyle. Fin and Lady navigate the 60s together and with her many suitors. Yet she was not willing to settle down with any one of them and being financially able to stand on her own she was not forced to. Schine shares more about each suitor and their relationship to Fin as they are constants in Lady and Fin’s lives over the years.
Lady eventually finds love on the Island of Capri where she always dreamed of going and being happy. Although this love still does not take a traditional course. And then there is Lydia, and soon it will be the next chapter in this family and time for Fin and Lydia to care for each other and create a family.
If you have resisted the audiobook world this would be a great place to start as it is mostly narrated by limited characters and this makes for easy listening. That being said I was surprised to learn just who was the narrator until I listened to the interview of Schine at the end of the audiobook, very interesting.
Finally, I cannot bid this post farewell without mentioning the beautiful cover art. I am drawn to reads by the cover and before I realized who was the author or what this was about the cover made me want to be sure not to miss it. I while I thought the building would play a bigger part it did not.
poofbooks 