Lucky in the Corner

Anshaw, Carol. Lucky in the Corner. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 2002

Reason read: April is National Dog Month.

In a word, Lucky in the Corner is about relationships. Okay, two words: complicated relationships. Nora and Fern have a strained mother-daughter relationship. Nora had Fern at a young age essentially defying her own deep rooted lesbian reality: she first kissed a girl at age twelve. Now, in a romantic relationship with sophisticated Jeanne, Nora is trying to find common ground with defiant Fern. Her daughter is the type of girl to get a tattoo just to piss off a parent.
Fern works as a psychic knowing full well this too is something her mother will never understand. To be fair, Fern has an uneasy relationship with her mother because she can never quite trust Nora will always be there for Fern. She has felt her mother could disappear at any second, exactly like a not-quite-there hologram. Call it her psychic abilities but Fern senses her mother’s betrayals before they happen. Beyond navigating a complicated relationship with her mother, Fern is also coping with a breakup, the changing relationship with her best friend (who is now a mother herself), and the peripheral relationships with her mother’s girlfriend, Jeanne and Fern’s cross dressing uncle, Harold. The only relationship not changing too much is the one Fern has with her dog, Lucky.

Quote to quote, “One of the most excellent things about him is that he is able to let observations roll to a comfortable spot on the side of the road” (p 203).

Playlist:

• Otis Redding’s “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long,”
• “Turn the Ship Around” by David Marquet,
• Della Reese’s “Someday,”
• “Chain of Fools” by Aretha Franklin,
• “Different Drum” by the Stone Poneys,
• Lena Horne’s version of “Stormy Weather”
• “If It Makes You Happy” by Sheryl Crow,
• “Book of Love,”
• The Supremes’ “Stop in the Name of Love,
• “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” by Brenda Lee,
• “I’m Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter” by Teresa Brewer,
• Radiohead,
• “Volare,”
• “Misty,”
• Rage Against the Machine,
• Beck,
• Yo-Yo Ma,
• Judy Garland.

Author fact: Anshaw has written a bunch of other things. I am only reading Lucky in the Corner.

Book trivia: this should be a movie.

Nancy said: Pearl mentioned Lucky in the Corner as having a character who is either gay or lesbian.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Gay and Lesbian Fiction: Out of the Closet” (p 93). Lucky in the Corner is also mentioned in “Great Dogs in Fiction” (also from Book Lust p 104).