If you are looking for an inviting group of gal pals with whom to spend those long winter nights and cold dreary mornings, pull up your favorite blue and white afghan and cozy up with a copy of The Friday Night Knitting Club.
Kate Jacobs' cheerful first novel reads like a version of Steel Magnoliasset in Manhattan.
Julia Roberts is already set to star in the movie version of this story about a single mother named Georgia Walker who has been abandoned by her gorgeous businessman beau, James.
She is left to raise their 12-year-old daughter, Dakota, alone. In order to keep their family of two afloat, she opens a knitting shop that attracts a circle of women who surprisingly become friends in a weekly knitting club.
The Friday Night Knitting Club is not a book solely about knitting; instead, it is a novel that revolves around the lives of a group of women who are in some way united by the craft.
Not all the club members knit, at least not with yarn, but together these complicated women are going to get through the obstacles life throws their way -- widowhood, single mothering, unemployment, divorce and illness -- by using the lessons of knitting as a pattern for their own lives.
Although Georgia is the main character who links each character to the other, each woman's story is vividly told throughout the book. Jacobs does a wonderful job familiarizing readers with all of their strengths and weaknesses.
The story relayed by Jacobs is believable, enchanting and surprisingly mature. Every aspect of these women's lives pull at your emotional heartstrings and draws you into the tight-knit circle of friendship that these women share.
It is at times comical, sympathetic and even heartbreaking. And with each crisis the club faces, and inevitably overcomes, The Friday Night Knitting Club gives its readers verification that life, despite its flaws, is definitely worth living.
While the ending may be somewhat conventional and expected, it is sure to make you have a fonder appreciation for your close circle of friends.
The book may be entitled The Friday Night Knitting Club, but it's a far cry from a how-to book about the trials and tribulations of finding your favorite needling technique.
Instead, it relates to any woman who feels that she is part of something greater than herself. It is about life, in all its glory, and in all its despair.
Grade: A
