We are going to have this as your second book for the week. We have a few weeks left and I have many a book to complete between then and now. I got this!
Customary warning: This is a reminder that these are my personal opinions. My thoughts and feelings are not your thoughts and feelings. I may not always be the target audience for a book; sometimes I am. If I do not like a book, that doesn’t mean you’ll dislike it. If I love a book or simply like a book, you may hate it. Take everything I say with this knowledge. If it sounds interesting to you despite what I’ve said, then go ahead and read it. You’ll only know you like something if you read it yourself.
That being said… Spoilers ahead.
The Lace Makers of Glenmara by Heather Barbieri
Synopsis From The Book
“You can always start again,” Kate Robinson’s mother once told her. “All it takes is a new thread.”Overwhelmed by heartbreak and loss, Kate follows her mother’s advice and flees to Ireland, her ancestral homeland, hoping to reinvent herself. In the seaside hamlet of Glenmara, the struggling twentysix-year-old fashion designer quickly develops a bond with members of the local lace-making society—and soon she and the lace makers are creating a line of exquisite lingerie, their skilled hands bringing flowers, Celtic dragons, nymphs, saints, kings, and queens to life with painterly skill. The circle also offers them something more: the strength to face their desires and fears. But not everyone in this charming, fading Gaelic village welcomes Kate, and a series of unexpected events threatens to unravel everything the women have worked so hard for.
Contemporary – Drama | A – E |Physical Abuse, Death by Accident | Love, Finding One’s self, Identity, Passed on History
Initial Thoughts Before Reading:
I got this book a long time ago and honestly I’ve been sitting here looking at it wanting to read it since I got it, but not having the heart to do so. I had other books I needed to read, and now I can read it. I accidentally flipped to the back where there are reader interviews with the authors and I really shouldn’t have read them. I always hate reading them. Anyway. Let’s read this book! Because today is as good a day as any to fall in love with a book.
Initial Thoughts After Reading:
Wow. It was a feel good plot, is what it was. I think I could have expected a different story, no I was expecting a different story, but it wasn’t bad. I have this habit of not reading the book descriptions and that is what really threw me off. If I had read it, I would have known.
Plot Overview:
Kate has run away to Ireland after her life has fallen apart. Her boyfriend left her for a model (the same model that walked at Kate’s fashion show). Kate is a fashion designer that doesn’t have much going for her and little inspiration. So she left Seattle and went to Ireland. After wandering and getting lost a man, called William the Traveler, takes her to Glenmara, a heavily Catholic town. It is here that Kate meets Aileen and Bernie, two lace makers.
Kate meets a man named Sullivan Deane, who starts to make her fall again. Kate and the lace makers of Glenmara, a few women who make lace for Glenmara, decide to try making lingerie out of the lace. One by one Kate makes lace garments for these women. And one by one they start to rework their relationships. Kate and Aileen but heads, because Aileen is jealous of Kate. Sake and Sullivan begin to have a relationship.
The Father, head of the church for the town, publicly condemn the women. One of the women almost dies when her husband finds the lace, because he beats her. All she can see is the good it has caused her, because he is out of her life for good. Another woman dies in a street accident (a car hits her), and the town comes together. They get a new priest, new everything. The lace lingerie takes off on the internet and Kate knows what she wants to do. She knows who she wants to be, at least for a little while.
What I Liked:
Kate; She was an interesting character. I thought her solution to make lingerie was a wonderful one and I think that by doing so she was able to find herself in her art of fashion design again.
Sullivan; He has such a tragic backstory for the loss of the woman he loved. I cry for him, goodness.
The Lacemakers of Glenmara; Each one of these women were fully realized and brilliant women. They all had their own loves, lives, and hopes and fears. The Lingerie sparked something in them, and I think it’ll help grow their teaching of their passed on lace making craft. I did love them all.
What I Would Have Liked or Changed:
None
Rating: 4/5
Notable Quotes:
“Don’t be afraid. You’ll find your way. This is a place to start.” – pg 2
Marlena Marie 
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