Friday, September 7, 2018

The Dinner List

If you could invite any five people - living or dead - to a dinner party, who would they be? For her birthday, Sabrina Nielsen invites her close friend Jessica, her on again-off again boyfriend Tobias, her estranged father, a favorite college professor and Audrey Hepburn. In The Dinner List by Rebecca Serle, we soon learn why these five people were brought together.

Through flashbacks of her life, we learn Sabrina's story.  Her father Robert left her mother when she was five and failed to make any contact with them. Pushed out of the marriage by her mother, he was an alcoholic and wouldn't get help. Sabrina can't wrap her head around that fact that he had another family - two daughters with his new wife.  

Troubling Sabrina is the distance that has developed between herself and her close friend Jessica since Jessica married and had a baby. Even at the dinner, Jessica has to run to the ladies room to pump breast milk and Sabrina is annoyed by the disruption of their dinner. 

Her almost ten year relationship with Tobias has so many starts and stops, she can't keep up with the
changing directions and the total lack of communication. Tobias is always willing to let silence speak for him and that drives Jessica crazy.

The sweet spot in the group is Professor Conrad, Sabrina's favorite college professor at USC. He taught philosophy and is thrilled to learn Sabrina is a book editor for a New York publishing house. Although there might be some changes with an upcoming merger between two publishing houses. 

And, of course, Audrey Hepburn, everyone's favorite. She is as charming as everyone believed, but with an iron will that did not bend under World War II circumstances. 

Before long, it becomes apparent why this group of people has been assembled. It is a charming, sweet story - sometimes sad, sometimes funny, but most times an enjoyable read.

My five would be Alexander Hamilton, Agatha Christie, Michelle Obama, Cary Grant and my mother Rena. They know why they were chosen. Who are your five?

1 comment:

Denise Kainrath said...

Nice review- I loved this book! I still can't decide who my 5 people would be, no matter how much I think about it!

Denise
www.deniseadelek.com