Books to Read if You Love Fierce, Smart Women
Need to power through the rest of your week? The
heroines in these riveting stories win you over with their courage, strength
and refusal to give up.
By Domenica Ruta and O Magazine's The Reading Room
2 of 7
The Alaskan Laundry
By Brendan Jones
384 pages;
Mariner Books
Nineteen-year-old Tara Marconi can hold her own
in a fight with a champion female boxer, a brown bear in the wild and her own
father. After the death of her mother, she leaves Philadelphia for Port Anna,
Alaska, where she hopes to jump-start a new life. She falls in lust with a
native Tlingit man decades her senior and scrapes by working in a
hatchery and cannery—ultimately figuring out a way to buy a fishing
boat. The long winters and brutal work help Tara come to the understanding that
"where you come from braids itself, wildly, into the place you choose to
build your life." The relationships portrayed in this debut novel draw you
in with their honesty, and Tara is a courageous, vibrant narrator. Though a
violent plot twist near the end feels a little gratuitous, Jones' big-hearted,
generous prose invite you into the sometimes thrilling, often grueling way of
life in this last American wilderness.
— Domenica Ruta
Published 06/28/2016