by contributor Wendy Gordon
Kerry Reichs. Remember that name. Her latest novel, What You Wish For published by Harper Collins, debuted at a book signing at Morton’s at Connecticut and L this past Tuesday.
Guests included a bevy of writers from a variety of publications and attendees from the worlds of art, business and non profits. It was nice to see everyone getting along……and egos were checked at the door. Let’s face it, we have to cheer for everyone that supports their local artists.
Reichs, a Charlottesville native and graduate of Oberlin College, Duke Law School, and Sanford Institute of Public Policy, has penned a poetic piece about alternative families. As the publisher puts it, “If what you wish for is a delightfully bittersweet novel filled with endearing, eccentric characters and situations in the vein of Jennifer Weiner, Jane Green, Marian Keyes, and Meg Cabot, then Kerry Reichs’s What You Wish For is the answer to your prayers.
The daughter of forensic crime fiction superstar Kathy Reichs (bestselling creator of the Temperence Brennan mystery series, the basis for TV’s Bones), Kerry Reichs’s writing talent is ingrained in her DNA, as she’s already demonstrated with her previous books, Leaving Unknown and The Best Day of Someone Else’s Life.
Her third novel, What You Wish For, is a tender, loving, funny, and unforgettable tale of five “modern” families, each one following a very different road to happiness, and yet another bravura example of Kerry Reichs’s phenomenal storytelling abilities. The traditional and nontraditional couples desperate for a baby . . . the adoptive parents . . . the single mom . . . the two who want nothing to do with parenthood. . . . This is a thoroughly modern story of the pursuit of family in all its forms—and of five very different ways of getting there.”
No spoiler alert necessary. There it is in a nutshell, but without all the detail. Get literary–you need to read the book. Brilliant. But Reich’s story comes from experience.
“As mother to a son and a very ‘non-traditional’ family and as a single mother by by choice . I was hoping to break the conception that there is such a thing as an ‘ideal family,” Reichs says. What I really want to show through telling these stories of these non traditional families, are that things can be a nurturing as they are non conventional.”
We would tell you more about the book chapter by chapter—but why should we? First of all, she’s an attorney. Second, it’s readily available on Amazon.com and other outlets. We’re going to drop a dime and support her in her writing efforts. And oh, PS, there are three other novels penned by this local phenom. You can find them there too.
