A Matter of Happiness by Tori Whitaker ~ a Review

by Susan Roberts

"Take from this story what you will, Melanie, and you can bury the rest." (p 17)

Amazon affiliate links are used on this site. A free book was provided for an honest review.

November 2022; Lake Union; 978-1542038072
audio, ebook, print (363 pages); women's fiction

This beautifully written novel looks at women and how they are viewed by the world and how they view themselves.  It's told in two timelines in the 1920s and modern day.  A lot of the time I enjoy one time period more than the other in dual-timeline stories.  In A Matter of Happiness, I enjoyed both timelines and really enjoyed reading about the growth of the woman who was telling her story.

1920s - Violet decides to leave her home in Kentucky and move to Detroit to work and learn more about life.  She gets a job, moves into a boarding house, and begins to make friends.  Her best friend Lela is very rich and soon Violet and Lela are spending their off hours at speakeasies and having lots of fun.  Violet starts dating Robert and that relationship leads her to a major decision in her life -- is she willing to marry if it means giving up her newfound freedom as a woman?

2018- Melanie is part of the public relations department at a bourbon distillery in Louisville Ky.  She has just broken her engagement because her boyfriend wanted her to give up her job and move so that he could get a better job.  She loves her job and is putting in lots of extra hours on a new brand of bourbon and trying very head to get a much sought-after promotion.  Violet was her great aunt and as she was investigating the car that Violet left for her ( a scarlet-red Jordan MX Playboy) she finds Violet's journal hidden in the trunk.  As she reads more about Violet's quest to be an independent woman, she realizes that Violet is also sharing what she learned in her life and during her adventure in Detroit.  In many ways.  Violet and Melanie had some of the same challenges in their lives in their quest to learn what it really means to be a woman.

This intriguing dual-timeline novel is about family and love, adventure and fulfillment but most of all it's about learning to be an independent woman while making sure you remember what's the most important part of life -- happiness.

Buy A Matter of Happiness at Amazon

(Kindle Unlimited subscribers can read the ebook for FREE)

Susan Roberts grew up in Michigan but loves the laid-back life at her home in the Piedmont area of North Carolina where she is two hours from the beach to the east and the mountains in the west.  She reads almost anything but her favorite genres are Southern Fiction and Historical Fiction.

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