Three Days in June by Anne Tyler

THREE DAYS IN JUNE by Anne Tyler is a LibraryReads Hall of Fame selection for February. Tyler recounts the story of Gail, aged 61 and her ex-husband, Max, on the weekend of the wedding of their daughter, Debbie, to Kenneth. It is a short period of time filled with a surge of emotions. Of course, there are in-law frictions and, potentially more disastrous, concerns about fidelity between the newlyweds. Gail, too, has disrupted her own life by impulsively walking out on her boss when she does not get an expected promotion. Reflecting on her situation, Gail later muses, “What was I supposed to do with the rest of my life? I'm too young for this, I thought. Not too old, as you might expect, but too young, too inept, too uninformed. How come there weren't any grown-ups around? Why did everyone just assume I knew what I was doing?” Her angry, anxious mood is not helped by Max’s arrival – he is forced to stay with her because he is fostering a cat and didn’t know that Kenneth is allergic. That leads to a rapprochement of sorts as Max and Gail support each other through the festivities. Tyler, a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist (for Breathing Lessons), brings these characters to life – especially Gail who finds social situations difficult (“Sometimes when I find out what's on other people's minds I honestly wonder if we all live on totally separate planets”) and is repeatedly described as lacking people skills. At 176 pages, the novel offers a relatively short introduction to readers unfamiliar with Tyler’s writing (see also French Braid or Clock Dance or A Spool of Blue Thread which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize), while appealing to Tyler’s many fans.