Sandra's Book Club: Blog Tour: THE MEASURE OF LIFE by Judith Works

THE MEASURE OF LIFE

Judith Works

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GENRE: Women's Fiction

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BLURB:

A story of love and loss, lies and truth, begins in Rome when Nicole shares a cappuccino and cornetto with her Italian tutor. The meeting sets off a chain of events that upends the course of her life. While Rome also brings deep friendships and immersion into a sumptuous food scene there is no escape from acknowledging the consequences of her actions. In search of forgiveness and healing, she moves to an island near her childhood home in Seattle only to find the way to reunite the remnants of her family and discover her true path is to return to Rome and face the past.

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Excerpt Three:

Deirdre knocked on the front door right on time. No one in Rome ever showed up on the appointed minute for a social occasion. I opened the door in my violet silk dress and bare feet. “Hang on, I can’t find my shoes and I need to finish my makeup.”

“Oh my gosh—I should have said it’s casual. Are you sure about the dress? Remember it’s Vashon.”

“I’m dressed now. I haven’t had a chance to go out for months.” I ran upstairs to finish.

Deirdre said, “Uh, a bit much for here,” when I returned wearing open-toed platform heels complementing the purple dress. After a pause, she added, “Oh, don’t worry, it’s fine and we’re late anyway.” I could tell she was flustered about something. When we parked in front of the gallery, I could see people holding glasses of wine while they looked at the photos. All looked comfortable in jeans and sweaters like Deirdre. I could feel my face was beginning to match my dress. People paused conversations to welcome Deirdre and her unknown and strangely dressed guest: me. Some stared briefly. Not unkind looks, but more of astonishment their friend had found such an alien.

A woman rescued me by saying, “Hi. I’m Meg.”

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Favorite and Least Favorite Part About Writing The Measure of Life

Interesting Question! Depending on my mood and level of frustration, the favorite and least favorite—to me meaning most and least difficult—changed day to day as I wrote. I wanted to tell the story of a woman’s struggle to find meaning amid her dysfunctional family in an unfamiliar and difficult setting, but to make it work I needed to make the characters complex and get into their lives– who were they, what did they do and why? What should they have done? As I wrote and rewrote, they gradually took on independent lives, their actions and words became ever more in keeping with their personalities–some kind and gentle, one vicious, another frustrated and struggling to find a goal and reach it. All of them intertwined with each other. Who wins in the game of life? Who loses?

To find an answer to these questions I explored themes of doomed romance, lost love, unexpected baby, expat life, marriage, mother and daughter relationships, and recovery from setbacks. To weave all these threads led to many edits and major rewrites as I settled on a meaningful plot to exploit my themes and let the characters breathe, live, and die. And that was the least favorite, or I should say, most challenging, aspect of writing the novel.

But my favorite and fun part was imagining the setting for each scene: Rome, beautiful and annoying at the same time, is a city where I lived for ten years. I am personally familiar with all the locations in the story. In fact, I wrote a memoir about that life, Coins in the Fountain. But The Measure of Life, although mostly set in Rome, is also set on an idyllic island near Seattle, another place I am familiar with, so I enjoyed contrasting the locations. With so many possible settings, especially in Rome, I had to limit myself to those that reflected emotional journey of my protagonist, Nicole, as she attempts and then succeeds in managing her life.

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

After I earned a law degree in midlife, I had the chance to leave the Forest Service in Oregon and run away to the Circus (Maximus). In reality my husband and I moved to Rome where I worked for the United Nations Food & Agriculture Organization for four years as a legal advisor to the director of human resources. I could see the Circus that had hosted chariot races during the Roman Empire from my office window.

My husband and I reluctantly returned to the US after four years. But we pined for the land of pasta, vino, art, and sunny piazzas. Then the gods smiled and offered a chance to return to Rome with the UN World Food Program. Six more years or food and frolic in the Eternal City passed much too quickly. The indelible experiences living in Italy and working for the UN were the genesis of my memoir Coins in the Fountain.

Social Media Links

Website: https://judithworks.net

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/judith.works.5

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/worksjudith

Threads: http://www.threads.com/WorksJudith

BlueSky: http://www.bluesky.com/WorksJudith

Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-measure-of-life-judith-works/1146224295?ean=9781509257799

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-measure-of-life-1

Google: https://play.google.com/store/search?c=books%q=9781509257805

Itunes: https://apple.com/us/book/the-measure-of-life/id6673911691

Books a Million: https://www.booksamillion.com/p/9781509257799

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