Six Degrees of Separation: From Masha to Hungry Monkey

Six Degrees of Separation is a monthly link-up hosted by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best. Each month a book is chosen as a starting point and linked to six other books to form a chain. A book doesn’t need to be connected to all the other books on the list, only to the one next to it in the chain.

Kate chose A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles as the starting book for September. I read this in 2018 with my book group and liked it even more than his first book (despite the use of the present tense which I dislike).  Our mothers were actually college classmates at Radcliffe.

Bellagrand (Book Review)

Title: Bellagrand       
Author: Paullina Simons

Publication: William Morrow, hardcover, March 2014

Genre: Historical Fiction   Setting: 20th century

 

Plot:  Bellagrand is a sequel to Sons of Liberty (which is likely a better starting point for new readers than this book) and written as a backstory to Simons’ bestselling trilogy, which begins with The Bronze Horseman.  In Sons of Liberty, blueblood and Harvard educated Harry Barrington met a beautiful Italian immigrant, Gina Attaviano.  They eloped prior to Bellagrand and, disowned by his wealthy Brahmin family and unable to hold a job, Harry continues and escalates his involvement in radical politics while Gina takes on the most menial jobs to support him and her infirm mother.