Why am I passionate about this?

I am an author who also penned a novel during the pandemic, with a timeline that stretched into the first six months of the pandemic–against the advice of my agent and the publishing industry at large. I know many authors choose not to write about intense political and social happenings, but that “life will never be the same again” feeling was something I couldn’t avoid. The pandemic threw people together and kept us apart at the same time. I was intensely interested in its incubator effect as well as the silo aspect quarantining had on all of our lives. 


I wrote

Daughter of a Promise

By Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg,

Book cover of Daughter of a Promise

What is my book about?

Days after graduating college in the spring of 2019, Betsabé Ruiz’s life is turning out to be nothing less than…

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of Tom Lake

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg Why did I love this book?

As the mother of three grown children who also returned home during the pandemic, I loved Patchett’s usage of an unanticipated reunion to tell her children a long, drawn-out story.

I love novels that explore the theme of inheritance, not of material possessions, but the emotional skills that are handed down between generations. Patchett explores what we share and what we hold back, as well as our children’s seemingly insatiable appetite for stories about our young lives.

This book is also a love story about Northern Michigan and a life dedicated to farming orchards. The protagonist's point of view may be that of a grown woman in her fifties, but in recounting the love affair of one summer, she reaffirms her own life choices. 

By Ann Patchett,

Why should I read it?

32 authors picked Tom Lake as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER * THE NO. 1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A REESE WITHERSPOON AND BBC RADIO 2 BOOK CLUB PICK 'A new Ann Patchett novel is always cause for celebration ... and Tom Lake is one of her best' i 'This comforting summer read has it all ... Young love, sibling rivalry and deep mother-daughter relationships' REESE WITHERSPOON 'Filled with the moments I live for in a story' BONNIE GARMUS, author of Lessons in Chemistry 'One of the most beloved authors of her generation' SUNDAY TIMES ----------------------------- This is a story about Peter Duke who went on…


Book cover of Day

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg Why did I love this book?

As if relationships between siblings and spouses aren’t already complicated enough, Cunningham throws the isolation and distance of COVID into the mix.

I love this author’s ability to turn extremely authentic and simple domestic dramas occurring on one day into revelatory ideas about child-rearing and the expectations family members have of one another. A generation of young parents, their inquisitive children, the devotion of a brother and sister, and an infatuation between brothers-in-law are the subjects of this well-paced work.

The effect of the pandemic on a marriage, on family members' psyches, and the aftermath of one of their deaths is written with tenderness and insight. This is a fabulous read depicting the new age in which we live.

By Michael Cunningham,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Day as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'Unsparing and tender' Colm Toibin, author of Brooklyn 'A brilliant novel from our most brilliant of writers' Colum McCann, author of Apeirogon 'A quietly stunning achievement' Ocean Vuong, author of On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

As the world changes around them, a family weathers the storms of growing up, growing older, falling in and out of love, losing the things that are most precious - and learning to go on.

April 5th, 2019: In a cozy brownstone in Brooklyn, the veneer of domestic bliss is beginning to crack. Dan and Isabel, troubled husband and wife, are both a little bit…


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Book cover of The Birthright of Sons: Stories

The Birthright of Sons By Jefferey Spivey,

The Birthright of Sons is a collection of stories centered around the experiences of marginalized people, namely Black and LGBTQ+ men. Although the stories borrow elements from various genres (horror, suspense, romance, magical realism, etc.), they are linked by an exploration of identity and the ways personhood is shaped through…

Book cover of Lucy by the Sea

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg Why did I love this book?

Elizabeth Strout is perfecting a practice I’m sold on–the literary recasting of characters from one novel to the next.

In this book, I got to return to Lucy Barton and her ex-husband, William, who were thrown together in a cabin in Maine due to the pandemic. Writing the novel from the first-person perspective of the protagonist, Strout includes this pragmatic character’s interior musings, specifically the things we increasingly noticed as time slowed down during COVID.

I could so relate to Lucy’s quirky character: give me ornery, critical, and desperate any day! Weren’t we all?  

By Elizabeth Strout,

Why should I read it?

5 authors picked Lucy by the Sea as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From Pulitzer Prize–winning author Elizabeth Strout comes a poignant, pitch-perfect novel about a divorced couple stuck together during lockdown—and the love, loss, despair, and hope that animate us even as the world seems to be falling apart.

“No novelist working today has Strout’s extraordinary capacity for radical empathy. . . . May droves of readers come to feel enlarged, comforted, and genuinely uplifted by Lucy’s story.”—The Boston Globe

ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, The New Yorker, Oprah Daily, Entertainment Weekly, San Francisco Chronicle, NPR, Time, The…


Book cover of Zero O'clock

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg Why did I love this book?

This YA novel was the first I read set during COVID times, and it hit me with the urgency of The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas.

I loved the author’s unwavering courage in tackling the racial subject matter head-on. Heartbreaking and whip-smart, it taught me what teens were going through with regard to virtual friendship, classrooms, and pop stardom. Farley’s novel captures a moment in time during the pandemic while others were still processing it.

Like a photo album, I wasn’t quite ready to revisit, it portrays the importance of a difficult time in our nation’s history coupled with that uneasy age of adolescence. Entertaining, yes, but a historical artifact, definitely.  

By C.J. Farley,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Zero O'clock as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 14, 15, 16, and 17.

What is this book about?

For sixteen-year-old Geth Montego, zero o’clock begins on March 11, 2020. By June, she wonders if it will ever end.

“An insightful, eye-opening, and inventive story. C.J. Farley has penned a novel that sheds an important light on real issues facing young people today.” ―Angie Thomas, author of The Hate U Give

In early March 2020 in New Rochelle, New York, teenager Geth Montego is fumbling with the present and uncertain about her future. She only has three friends: her best friend Tovah, who’s been acting weird ever since they started applying to college; Diego, who she wants to ask…


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Book cover of Shadow of the Hidden

Shadow of the Hidden By Kev Harrison,

It’s Seb’s last day working in Turkey, but his friend Oz has been cursed. Superstition turns to terror as the effects of the ancient malediction spill over, and the lives of Oz and his family hang in the balance. Can Seb find the answers to remove the hex before it’s…

Book cover of Leave the World Behind

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg Why did I love this book?

The opening of this book knocked me out, and I was hooked.

I usually veer toward literary, slower, familial dramas, but this book combined what I love in literary family dynamics with the frightening premise of an inexplicable disaster occurring in the outside world. The suspicion we were quick to possess about others during the early days of the pandemic is heightened to a new level with two couples pitted against each other, one preoccupied with the welfare and antics of their children.

I loved the construct that had even spouses second-guessing each other. The intensity of the situation brought out the worst and eventually the better sides of all the characters, a phenomenon that resonated as I read this book during the first year of the pandemic, at the same time rioters invaded our nation’s capital.  

By Rumaan Alam,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked Leave the World Behind as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

*A THE TIMES #1 BESTSELLER*
*THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER*
*A BARACK OBAMA SUMMER READING PICK 2021*

'Easily the best thing I have read all year' KILEY REID, AUTHOR OF SUCH A FUN AGE

'Intense, incisive, I loved this and have still not quite shaken off the unease' DAVID NICHOLLS

'I was hooked from the opening pages' CLARE MACKINTOSH

'Simply breathtaking . . . An extraordinary book, at once smart, gripping and hallucinatory' OBSERVER

_______

A magnetic novel about two families, strangers to each other, who are forced together on a long weekend gone terribly wrong

Amanda and Clay head…


Explore my book 😀

Daughter of a Promise

By Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg,

Book cover of Daughter of a Promise

What is my book about?

Days after graduating college in the spring of 2019, Betsabé Ruiz’s life is turning out to be nothing less than cinematic. Although her job at a white-shoe Wall Street investment bank is the opportunity of a lifetime, she is not prepared for the magnitude of wealth swirling about her, the long hours and close quarters that infuse her professional relationships with intimacy, nor an unexpected attraction to her boss. And like all great films, Betsabé’s New York dream comes with a twist that challenges her to find a balance between where she came from and where she’s going.

Told in the retrospective as a letter to her unborn son, this book represents Betsabè’s coming-of-age as well as a modern retelling of a biblical love story.

Book cover of Tom Lake
Book cover of Day
Book cover of Lucy by the Sea

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Interested in Michigan, pandemics, and Long Island?

Michigan 69 books
Pandemics 36 books
Long Island 29 books