Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant - Anne Tyler

Pearl Tull is dying. She's eighty-one, and still in possession of her senses, although she finds it hard to speak. As she lies in her bed, she's aware of her middle-aged bachelor son Ezra being there; but as she's nearly blind, she can't actually see him. Her thoughts drift back to the past. She thinks of her oldest son Cody, remembering how she and her husband Beck decided that one child was enough, until Cody developed croup. Back in 1931 it was quite a serious condition and they had decided it would be better to have another child, just in case something happened to Cody. However Cody lived, and after Ezra arrived they worried about him too, so Jenny was born. ...  Read the complete review