A House Among the Trees by Julia Glass
Richly drawn portrait of Tomasina, the assistant to famed children’s author/illustrator Mort Lear, who dies at the beginning of the book, and leaves Tommy his house–and responsibility for his estate. It resolves, present-plot-wise, around the bequest, or lack thereof, to a museum, but the real rich material is elsewhere, in the life of the actor who plays Mort in a movie, in Tommy’s childhood. I ultimately felt it had too many points of view; I’d have jettisoned the sad single museum curator. Maybe necessary for the plot to fully materialize, but a detriment to focus on the most compelling material.
Amy P. Knight 