Earth's the right place for love A novel

Review by Booklist Review

This prequel to The Story of Arthur Truluv (2017) brings Arthur Moses' young adult years to the forefront. As Arthur nears the end of his life, his solitary thoughts turn to his youth. Mentally stepping back decades in time, he relives the highs and lows of his teens and early adulthood in the late 1940s and early 1950s in the small town of Mason, Missouri, the setting for several of prolific author Berg's previous novels. Arthur remembers meeting the love of his life, losing a family member, and learning to see his parents in a new light. Capturing timeless issues of fickle friendships, unrequited love, and parental expectations, Berg's latest novel will appeal to fans of Catherine Ryan Hyde, Anna Quindlen, and Erica Bauermeister. Her treatment of teenage love is especially poignant, as Arthur weighs the pros and cons of professing his love for the object of his affection, Nola, versus maintaining their deep, stable friendship. Berg's latest novel is a charming and heartwarming glimpse of an elderly man's earliest days.

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.

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Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Berg revisits the protagonist of her 2017 novel The Story of Arthur Truluv with this gentle coming-of-age. In 1947 Missouri, 16-year-old Arthur Moses has a crush on Nola McCollum, but she has her eyes on Arthur's older brother, Frank, a high school senior. Frank, though, has been secretly dating the new, young English teacher Mary Anker. He also bears the brunt of their father, Eugene's rages, sparked partly by Eugene's frustration over his declining milk delivery business. Taking advice from Frank, Arthur works up the nerve to ask Nola to the movies, only to have their date called off when a tornado rips through town. More complications, including another boy swooping in to take credit for Arthur's gift of flowers, stymie him further. Frank, meanwhile, learns Mary is pregnant, upending his hopes of becoming a writer. The stakes generally feel pretty low--Berg homes in on the family's everyday moments, as Arthur picks up wisdom from older neighbors and Eugene lands a new job--so when a freak accident involving Frank arrives, it feels a bit jarring. Still, Berg does a nice job tending to the slow-burn romance between Arthur and Nola, which readers of the earlier book know will lead to a lifelong marriage. The author's fans ought to be satisfied. Agent: Suzanne Guck, WME. (Mar.)

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

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Review by Library Journal Review

Berg calls back to her 2017 novel The Story of Arthur Truluv in this sweet and sad story that stands on its own. It explores the early life of Arthur (who is an octogenarian in the 2017 novel) and what turned him into the kind and sensitive man who so many readers fell in love with. This new novel is set in 1947, with Arthur as a 16-year-old growing up in small-town Missouri. Awkward and sweet, with a deep love of trees and the natural world, his other deep love is Nola--one of the prettiest girls in school, and way out of his league. Arthur relies on his handsome, charismatic older brother Frank to guide him in his patient effort to conquer Nola's heart. Frank has his own issues, including his and Arthur's overbearing and sometimes scary father. Frank has also fallen in love with his gorgeous young English teacher and impresses her with his vibrant writing, to the point that they're secretly planning to start a new life together once Frank graduates. Then a terrible tragedy hits the Truluv family, changing Arthur forever. VERDICT Berg continues to channel her own version of Fannie Flagg with her small-town Southern tale that goes back in time to fill in the details of a memorable character's life.--Beth Liebman Gibbs

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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Review by Kirkus Book Review

A coming-of-age story about two brothers supporting each other through life's twists and turns in Mason, Missouri. It is the spring of 1947, and 16-year-old Arthur Moses is in love. Not the fleeting puppy love of his peers, but a deep, all-consuming love that he's certain is real. The only problem is that Nola McCollum doesn't look his way, and when she finally does, it's to ask Arthur to pass her number on to his older brother, Frank. Arthur says he will but instead hides the note in his desk and asks Frank for his advice on how to win Nola over. Frank needs advice for his own troubles, and Berg's narration of the two young men whispering to each other at night in their shared bedroom lends a profound sweetness to the novel even as the boys deal with the harsh realities of their lives such as an abusive father. Despite his lack of success wooing Nola, Arthur, who loves trees and his hometown and treats everyone he meets with gentle kindness, soldiers on with calm resolve, certain that someday his brother's advice will lead Nola to him. But when a gut-wrenching tragedy hits the Moses household, Arthur is not sure he can or should ever try to be happy again. While the relationship between the brothers is the novel's crowning jewel, Berg's ability to create characters--even some we meet for only a few scenes--with rich inner lives cannot be overpraised: "But he knew that now he would be seeing her in an altogether different way. There she would be, standing fierce on her stoop, but behind her would be a lot of other hers, younger hers, wearing a polka-dotted dress or a red wool suit, or the cotton-print robe she'd had to cut extra-careful to keep whole the wings of the big white birds." A poignant tale of love, grief, and the resiliency of the human spirit. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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Chapter 1 Mason, Missouri April 1947 Sometimes Arthur snuck out of his house at night. He didn't go anywhere, just sat on the back steps outside the kitchen door. Here, he pondered things that were too big to fit inside the bedroom he shared with his older brother, Frank. Even in sleep, Frank seemed a large and nearly incandescent presence. A person like Frank didn't leave a lot of room for a guy like Arthur, unintentional though it was. And Arthur didn't mind, really. Being outside was a reminder to him that there was a place for all things, and, in that respect, didn't everything have equal value? Off to the side in the backyard, for instance, were daisies. Up above was the majesty of the moon and the stars and the rings of Saturn that he knew were there whether he could see them or not. And here, sitting on the steps in his pajamas, was Arthur, feeling that he was right where he should be. For him, life was like a gift perpetually ready for the opening. Cockeyed optimist, Frank called him, but Arthur wasn't sure he was cockeyed at all. He wished that a certain someone would care to hear his thoughts. Hear and understand them. He guessed that everyone came to a time in their life when they started to be aware of a specific kind of loneliness. It reminded him of filmstrips he'd seen in science class: seeds buried in the earth and then sprouting, growing what looked like arms reaching out. On the rough concrete beneath him, he traced out the letters to her name: NOLA. Then he went back inside. The next day, after school let out, Arthur went again to the chain-link fence near the front entrance of the high school and waited, hoping to catch a glimpse of Nola McCollum. He'd been doing this for several days now. Sometimes he smashed down dirt clods, a poor attempt to seem like he was doing something. More often he stood sideways, as though his attention were taken up by something off in the distance. If she did not come out, he knew she had stayed after for one reason or another: a club meeting, cheerleading practice, rehearsal for a concert or a play. But if she did come out, he watched as she descended the steps and turned left toward home. Nola was very popular, and almost always with a group of friends and admirers; Arthur once counted twelve people with her. But today she came out by herself, and everything in Arthur ratcheted up to high alert. She was looking down and smiling, seemingly lost in thought. He liked the brown tweed skirt and yellow sweater she was wearing, and the way her coat was open to the mild April day. It was a chance for him finally to talk to her alone, to say . . . ​Well, that was the problem. To say what? She was mythical to him, barely real. But there she was, carrying books and wearing socks and shoes like everyone else. Just as she passed Arthur, the wind lifted her black hair and blew it across her face. Arthur swallowed around the boulder in his throat and called out, "Hey, Nola!" She moved her hair aside and turned to look at him. "Oh, hi, Arthur!" He walked up to her, his heart banging in his chest. "I'm glad to see you," she said. "Oh!" he said. "Well, that's nice!" "I've been meaning to ask you if you could do me a favor." She turned her head and regarded him sideways, her eyebrows raised. Was she flirting with him? "Sure! What is it?" "Well . . . ​it's just that, like a lot of other girls, I have a crush on your brother." Arthur's heart sank. "Frank?" "Uh-huh. Gosh, I'm embarrassed to ask you, but do you think there's any chance . . . ​Can I give you my number to give to him?" "Yeah, I guess so. Sure." She pulled out a piece of paper and a pencil and wrote down the number. When she looked up, she smiled at him. "I'm probably being foolish," she said. She folded the paper and handed it to him. Arthur shoved it deep into his pocket. "You know what?" he said. "I think it's a good idea to let someone know you care about them. They might not be aware." He tried to look meaningfully into her eyes. But Nola only said, "You're so nice to say that. Thanks for not making fun of me." "I would never make fun of you, Nola." She hiked up her shoulders. "Well, that's that!" "Right," Arthur said. "See you," she said, and her gaze lingered on him for a moment. Then she walked away. Arthur watched her go. It was awfully sweet, the way she'd said, "See you." And he thought she'd looked at him in a way she never had before. Maybe she'd never really noticed him before, but now something could have been planted in her brain. Oh, sure, she'd approached him wanting him to give her number to his brother, but wasn't it possible she'd been aware that she was giving it to Arthur, too? As Arthur started to head home, someone else came out of the building: Harvey Guldorp, a boy even more invisible in their sophomore class than Arthur believed he himself was. Harvey was wearing a winter cap with the ear flaps down and the chin strap firmly affixed, despite the mild weather. "Hey Arthur," Harvey said, "why are you always hanging around after school lets out?" "Ferret," some people called Harvey, for the way he was always finding things out. "What are you waiting for?" "Nothing," Arthur said. So far, it wasn't a lie. "You want to come over and read Green Hornet comics?" Harvey asked. "I got some new ones." Arthur didn't. But he knew enough about rejection to say, "Sure." And so he moved away from his fantasy of making headway with Nola and into the reality of Harvey Guldorp's invitation to read comics in what Arthur imagined to be Harvey's messy bedroom, overheated and no doubt smelling of Vicks VapoRub. Excerpted from Earth's the Right Place for Love: A Novel by Elizabeth Berg All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.

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