Michelle Huneven’s Off Course deals
with love. Married love, adulterous
love, family love, and love between friends.
The story is set in the 1980s and
centers around Cressida Hartley who is attempting to finish her dissertation
and moves into her family’s vacation A-frame in the Sierras to have the privacy
she requires. The author describes the
landscape, and the towns Cressida travels around in, in great detail and that added
to the book’s appeal.
Cressida, or Cress, finds part time
work here and there, partly as a means of making an income, and partly to
distract her from the fact that she is not working on the dissertation. Eventually she becomes emotionally attached to
a carpenter from the area. Complications arise as they try to sort out their
romance.
The book brings up questions about
obsessive love and an explanation that is offered at the end of the book did
not quite ring true to me. I was
reminded of the characters Natalie Wood and Warren Beatty played in Splendor in
the Grass, as much as anything.
I would recommend this book and I
think it would be a good book club book.
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