Monday, Monday

by Elizabeth Crook

In this gripping, emotionally charged novel, a tragedy in Texas changes the course of three lives

On an oppressively hot Monday in August of 1966, a student and former marine named Charles Whitman hauled a footlocker of guns to the top of the University of Texas tower and began firing on pedestrians below. Before it was over, sixteen people had been killed and thirty-two wounded. It was the first mass shooting of civilians on a campus in American history.

Monday, Monday follows three students caught up in the massacre: Shelly, who leaves her math class and walks directly into the path of the bullets, and two cousins, Wyatt and Jack, who heroically rush from their classrooms to help the victims. On this searing day, a relationship begins that will eventually entangle these three young people in a forbidden love affair, an illicit pregnancy, and a vow of secrecy that will span forty years. Reunited decades after the tragedy, they will be forced to confront the event that changed their lives and that has silently and persistently ruled the lives of their children.With electrifying storytelling and the powerful sense of destiny found in Ann Patchett's Bel Canto, and with the epic sweep of Jess Walter's Beautiful Ruins, Elizabeth Crook's Monday, Monday explores the ways in which we sustain ourselves and one another when the unthinkable happens. At its core, it is the story of a woman determined to make peace with herself, with the people she loves, and with a history that will not let her go. A humane treatment of a national tragedy, it marks a generous and thrilling new direction for a gifted American writer.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, Book Club, Adult Fiction, Contemporary, Historical, Womens

352 pages, Hardcover

First published April 29, 2014

About the author

I grew up mostly in San Marcos, Texas, (with a brief time away in Washington D.C and Australia) graduated from San Marcos High School, attended Baylor and Rice, moved for a while to New Braunfels, Texas, and now live in Austin. One of the great blessings of my childhood was having a mother who read to my brother and sister and me for hours every night, long after we could read for ourselves. Those nights of listening transported us to foreign places and other centuries and allowed us to connect with characters living lives in stark contrast to our own. This was a great gift my mother gave us.

I've written six novels, including The Night Journal, which received The Spur Award from Western Writers of America and the Willa Literary Award from Women Writing the West, Monday, Monday, which received the Jesse H. Jones Award from the Texas Institute of Letters and was named a Best Fiction Book of 2014 by Kirkus Reviews, and The Which Way Tree, which received The Willa Literary Award and is currently in development for film. The Madstone will be published in November of 2023.

I'm a slow, slow reader (one of those people you see in public places staring at pages and moving their lips,) and I'll be giving most books on Goodreads a rating of four or five stars, because that many hours spent together creates a certain loyalty. If a book doesn't capture me I usually set it aside; mostly what you'll see here are books I've loved.

Reviews

[Paul Bryant · Rating 3 out of 5]

So what’s this one all about?

Well, there are two answers to that. Probably more than two but we haven’t got all day. It’s about the 1966 University of Texas massacre by Charles Whitman, but it’s not really. It’s about one particular victim who was shot and survived, and the guys she became involved with because of that. So it’s about the coils of fate and how one thing leads to another and randomness.

But also?

It’s about goodly-hearted people. How they cope with difficult stuff like giving babies up for adoption and spouses who have affairs and ordinary stuff like that.

Ah so are you going to rain down hate on this book because it’s about goodly-hearted people and not about the details of the third most horrible school shooting in US history? What kind of a monster are you?

No, no, ain’t no raining hate. But … er…

WHAT? Oh sorry, what?

Well, I think if you sympathetically tell the story of goodly hearted people working out their emotional tanglements goodlily, you are in danger of the fast-rising sud-flood of soap, and there were times when entire chapters were taken over by Tide Plus Febreze.

So I guess you’d have preferred it to be all about the shootings and not about the emotional lives of the people, you sick perv?

I find that a rather loaded question.

Well let me rephrase then. You’d have preferred it to be all about the shootings and not about the emotional lives of the people, right? You sick perv.

No, no, not at all. I liked it. It only toppled into complete inanity once – can I tell you about that?

Oh sure, let’s slag off the goodly-hearted. Why not.

Well, this is more about how a perfectly decent author (and her agent, editor and anyone who read the MS) could let a truly gobsmacking sentence into what is otherwise a very controlled, stately narrative.

Okay, I’m intrigued now. Let’s have the sentence.

I have to do a little teensy plot spoiler here, so purists will want to look away now, but there’s this family gathering and there’s a kid who had brought along his pet tadpole –

Tadpole?

Yes, tadpole, and it dies. So they have this funeral for it in the garden.

For a tadpole?

Yes, for a tadpole. And they’re all standing around with these weighty matters thrumming away as buried secrets are about to be revealed and Elizabeth Crook comes out with

Wyatt wasn’t the only person in the gathering whose thoughts were not with the dead tadpole.

I have to admit, I guffawed. Probably not the reaction Elizabeth Crook was after.

Hmmph. Amphibia aside, do you recommend this or what?

Well, about half way through it struck me that it was the novel equivalent of a movie like You Can Count On Me or Rachel Getting Married. I love those movies. I should have loved this book more than I ended up doing.

So who would it be good for?

Texan geologists would totally squee this book. A small but surely important demographic.

[Patti · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book started out so promising...absolutely gripping in its description of the "Texas bell tower" shootings.

Then it all went to hell. I couldn't stand Shelley or Wyatt--I don't fault them for falling for each other but I fault them for being completely boring. There was just no character development for either of them.

I would have rather the story have been told by Jack and Delia who were interesting and sympathetic. I would have loved to have spent time with them and Carlotta. But Shelley...dry as dust and twice as dull.

One thing I did find interesting is the discussion of what to do with the baby of an unwed mother in the early 1970s. Everyone was focused on what was best for the baby--with an uneducated, unmarried girl with few prospects beyond working in the feed store or with parents who had resources and could provide stability. Something missing in the reproductive rights talk is that very thing--what is best for a particular child/eventual child (I think life starts with the first breath)?

Once Shelley had the kid, she became boring to me again. The book just meandered, jumping ahead years and decades, throwing in a few paragraphs where Carlotta decided what to do with her life, throwing in a tragedy...just sort of filling up the pages.

If the book had stayed in the late 60s and focused more on the aftermath of the shooting and trauma of the three main characters and perhaps focused on Jack/Delia more, I am sure I would have enjoyed it much more. As it was, it was a definite "meh".

[Aditi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thomas Eugene Robbins, an American author has quoted about killing as:

“There are many things worth living for, a few things worth dying for, and nothing worth killing for.”

Elizabeth Crook, another American author has penned down her new novel, Monday, Monday based on shooting in University of Texas on 1st August, 1966, and it happen to be the first brutal shooting incident in America's history.

I'd like to thank the author, Elizabeth Crook, for giving me this opportunity to read her incredible novel.

As per Wikipedia, Charles Joseph Whitman, an ex- US Marine, killed 16 people and wounded 32 others in a spree shooting in Austin, Texas on the University of Texas at Austin campus in and around the Tower on the afternoon of August 1, 1966.

Charles Whitman changed the lives of three ill-fated human beings who happen to be present and become the victim of Whitman's brutal decision to kill people randomly. Based on a real-life incident, Crook's novel, Monday, Monday sounded so very real to me. Crook has highlighted the aftermath of Whitman's shooting from the UT's tower.

Shelly, a twenty something student of UT (University of Texas) was one of the ill-fated victim of Whitman's killing spree, but Shelly, who's ambition was to join the Peace Corps gets gunned down by Whitman which leaves her brutally injured by the bullets and dying on the ground. But two brave heroes, named Wyatt and Jack, jumps into the raining bullets to save as many as people. Shelly happens to be one the victims to be rescued by Wyatt and Jack. But soon after this deadly ordeal, everyone goes back to their own lives but leaving Shelly, Wyatt and Jack's lives drastically changed, leading which to intertwine the three lives through blood and love. But for Shelly, it becomes very difficult to make peace with her traumatized past and let go of the painful memories.

Monday, Mondayis a beautifully crafted tale on the back-drop of Charles Whitman's shooting in the campus of UT. The author has made us relive that dreadful incident so exquisitely and takes us back in that period so vividly. I loved the author's style of unfolding her characters centering the shooting incident. Shelly is one such character who you would love to hate- she's an epitome of a woman who knows the value of sacrifice amidst of so much pain and trauma. Shelly knows how to stand strong in the moment of her weakness, she proves to be a great mother and a loving wife, but she never learnt to make peace with herself. Wyatt is a hero, married to Elaine, loves painting and despises his past that Whitman has changed it so beautifully for him. He became fortunate in the matters of his heart and unfortunate in his marriage to Elaine. Whitman took away one thing from Jack that will forbid him to travel the road to fatherhood. And these three unfortunate victim's lives get mingled with one another, the resultant is really sweet and forgiving, but that became too hard for Shelly and Wyatt. The characters are so unnerving and with their flaws make us see their true sides of their demeanor. The author's flow of narration makes the book more interesting and the story that she has spun out of the shooting incident is quite realistic and very compelling.

Do read this journey of three individual human beings who were all victims of Whitman's shooting in UT both physically as well as emotionally!

[Ben · Rating 2 out of 5]

The UT Bell Tower Sniper of 1966. It was an earlier generation's Columbine, an unthinkable act of senseless violence directed against helpless students.

I was hoping for a book that would explore the psychological scars of surviving such a tragedy. What I got instead was a chapter about the shooting and 50 chapters about a woman who gets pregnant by a married man, gives the baby to the man's cousin and wife, and wrestles with guilt over the decision. Which all has something to do with the shooting, in a very oblique way, but not much. I felt rather bait-and-switched.

[switterbug (Betsey) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although MONDAY MONDAY is a multi-generational family saga with a strong story/plot, this is also a novel of solid, energetic themes. The 1966 Charles Whitman sniper spree from the University of Texas, Austin, clock tower forms the framework of the novel. Graduate students and best friends Wyatt and Jack save a stranger's life, a young undergraduate named Shelly, when she is shot while crossing the South Mall plaza of the university. Both Jack and Shelly were injured, leaving post-trauma scars. In Jack's case, it affects him and his wife in an unfortunate way that cannot be undone. For Shelly, the physical scars create a minor disability and loss of body image. She is also shocked, and too frightened to immediately return to college. Wyatt returns to his uncertain marriage and toddler son, expressing his trauma through his paintings (he is an art student and teacher). However, all three lives become inextricably connected, stemming from that fateful Monday.

It is difficult to express the themes without spoiling the plot, and I don’t want to ruin the proverbial reader discovery. However, the themes are universal, and also very personal to the characters. How do our (physical and figurative) scars affect our lives, and those of our families and friends? Shelly, the story’s primary protagonist, veers from her established plans after the shooting. She had wanted to graduate, join the Peace Corps, and volunteer in foreign, exotic countries. Instead, transgressions follow the tragedy, creating a domino effect that reaches into future generations. Secrets and unorthodox decisions, especially for that era, generate more confounding problems—a sort of *damned if you do tell, damned if you don’t* set of conflicts. Every choice is weighted with gravity and reverberating consequences.

In the book's ending acknowledgements, the author declared that this novel illuminates what it means to be a wife and mother. This is true for Shelly, and Wyatt's and Jack's wives. But this is also applicable to being a father and husband. Moreover, and what gripped me the most, is the question of how we identify our heroes. There are the lifesaving deeds that cleave us to that person, such as what subsequently happened in Crook's novel after the Whitman tragedy. But, what about the small, almost imperceptible, accumulating acts that a parent or spouse conducts every day, over a lifetime, for their families? What characterizes courage, heroism, guts? This novel also explores the sense of shame that comes with the failure to step forward and help another, and how one copes and compensates for that deficiency. As Shelly, Wyatt, and Jack become parents, and then grandparents, the novel illuminates that day to day mettle and faithful commitment is one kind of courage that amasses in less dazzling ways than saving someone's life, but is no less significant.

Although I finished this book over a week ago, I had difficulty rating it, and trying to be "objective." Although Crook writes some exquisite and soulful passages, many of her sentences have a boggy syntax. A good copy editor could purge the surplus of dependent clauses and superfluous adverbs that slow the momentum of the story. Periodically, Crook's focus is wobbly, and she follows a secondary trail too far from the center. However, time has only enhanced this story for me. For one thing, Austin is my home, and UT Austin my alma mater. The author's details of the landscape, geography, and atmosphere from Austin to Alpine was spot-on, and elegantly described. More importantly, there are elements of the story that mirror my own life, which provoked a lot of deep reflection several days after I finished the book. The setting, and the organic portrayal of humanity, eclipsed the flaws. Therefore, I am awarding 5 stars. Crook manifests how the chain of life is wrought from our virtues and vices in equal measure, and that the power of grace and forbearance can atone for the deepest of scars.

“Maybe he [Charles Whitman] had chosen her on nothing more than a random impulse. That was probably the case. But the older she became, the more she wanted to feel that she’d had a hand in the matter—that some action of her own had determined the outcome, that she had plotted her own misguided course. It seemed better than being a luckless victim of fate.”
4.5 rounded up

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Elizabeth Crook has wonderfully portrayed the manner in which scars from a traumatic event – both visible and invisible scars – affect the lives of those involved for generations. With great sadness, I well remember the day that Charles Whitman shot, injured and murdered randomly from the Tower at the University of Texas. This novel follows the life of Shelly, who was seriously injured but survived the attack, with only scars and physical imperfections; Wyatt, who saved Shelly’s life; and Jack, Wyatt’s Vietnam vet cousin who was also injured in the shootings. As a result of trauma, physical wounds and generally feeling lost, Shelly changes her plans to join the Peace Corps, remains in Austin and reconnects with Wyatt. Wyatt is married, and their relationship is, of course, very conflicted. The novel follows, Shelly, Jack and Wyatt as they navigate through a circle of life in which they and their children remain very intertwined – although many secrets are kept from the children. I thought the author did an excellent job of showing the often undiscussed effects of a traumatic event and the way in which the connection of those who experienced it can endure for many years.
I attended the University of Texas (Law School), so the scenes in Austin were very close to my heart. But Ms. Crook has done more than that – she has beautifully illustrated central and west Texas. From places in Austin I remember well (the Drag, the Tower, the restaurants, the bars), to Alpine, to Aquarena Springs and many others – she just “got it”! Thank you, Elizabeth Crook, for making us not forget a terrible event and for making us think of it in a more individual, human way, even after all these years.

[Book Concierge · Rating 4 out of 5]

In August 1966 Charles Whitman shot and killed or wounded dozens of students, faculty and first responders from the clock tower on the University of Texas campus in Austin. This novel explores the effects of that event on the lives of three fictitious characters: Shelly, a young student who is seriously wounded, and two cousins, Wyatt and Jack, who come to the aid of Shelly and other victims.

What a wonderfully complex character-driven story. Growing up in Texas in the '60s I vividly remember the event that opens this novel. It was a reference to that event in the book publicity that caught my attention and put this on my TBR list. But the mass killing is only the plot device Crook uses to introduce these characters to one another. The novel really focuses on the relationships they build – to one another, and to other people not involved in the killings on the August day. As the story follows them through the decades we come to know their strengths, weaknesses, dreams, and fears.

I’m so glad I finally read it!

[Carol · Rating 4 out of 5]

Initially set in the mid-1960's, this entertaining novel begins with a horrific true-crime shooting with heroic efforts by two grad-students who save the life of a younger fellow student caught up in the massacre. The story tells how one random act of violence drastically changes the direction of three lives over several decades, and illustrates how good can come out of evil.

This work of fiction is a quick and easy read that kept my interest throughout.

[Sharon Huether · Rating 5 out of 5]

In August 1966 a former Marine named Charles Whitman hauled a footlocker of guns to the University of Texas Bell tower. He starts shooting at students. Sixteen students were killed and thirty two were wounded.
The story follows three students. Shelly wounded. Wyatt and Jack who were cousins, they were helping the wounded.

There was a love affair, an elicit pregnancy and vows of secrecy that will span forty years of their lives.

This was a hard book to put down.

[Larry H · Rating 4 out of 5]

Life can change in a split second, and one's actions can have ramifications that ripple for years to come.

One August day in 1966, Charles Whitman climbed to the top of a clock tower at the University of Texas in Austin and began shooting at random people. He killed 16 people and wounded more than 30 others that day, striking fear into a quiet summer day on campus, and changing the lives of numerous people.

Shelly was one of the people shot by Whitman that day, as she was leaving one of her summer classes. She was lying in the middle of campus, wounded and bleeding, fearing that she would die, when she was rescued by two fellow students, no-nonsense Vietnam vet Jack Stone, and his art student cousin Wyatt Calvert. The split-second decision to rescue Shelly has tremendous ramifications for both young men, and it sets into motion a number of things—a secret affair, an unexpected pregnancy, and a life-changing decision—actions that link the three of them together for years to come. And then many years later, the three are brought together again, forced to confront the decisions they made and the secrets they and some of their loved ones have kept.

Monday, Monday is a moving story of the consequences of our decisions, some made in a split second, some made with significantly more consideration. It's a story about how love endures, even through time and distance, yet the shape of that love may change. It's the story of how tragedy can both wound and unite, and it's also the story of the myriad ways in which secrets can touch so many people in so many different ways.

Elizabeth Crook did a great job laying out this story and the ripple effects of both Whitman's shooting spree and the decisions the main characters made in its aftermath. She's a tremendously talented storyteller, because while so much of the plot seems inevitable and familiar, you feel truly engrossed in the characters' lives, so you want to keep reading even as you're fairly certain how the plot will proceed. At times it's a little more melodramatic than it needs to be, but Crook's ability to convey emotions and created layered characters keeps the book from being overly maudlin and sustains your interest.

I thought this was a really well-written, emotional book. Definitely worth a read.

[Craig Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 stars, a wonderful book about a horrific tragedy and the wonderful things that can result from tragedy when looking back on life. The book starts with the real life school shooting in 1966, where a gunman in a tower shot and killed sixteen people and wounded over thirty more. Shelly, the main character, is shot quickly and saved by a fellow student, Wyatt, and his cousin Jack, who is also shout and wounded. The story deepens here as Shelly and Wyatt start a forbidden romance and all the consequences, decisions, twists, and turns for the three of them and their families. I loved this book and had a hard time putting it down. It was filled with complex characters and relationships and was about so much more than just a school shooting. I think my favorite thing about this book was the framework, how it began and ended just perfectly, with a well developed story that kept me hooked. I highly recommend this great novel.

[Barbara Bryant · Rating 2 out of 5]

I could have given this book more stars, as it was not a bad read at all, but I was disappointed in the direction of the story.

Nominally about three characters who were strongly affected by the shooting at the University of Texas, where a man shot wildly from the campus tower ( a true story), the beginning of the book shows promise as an examination of life post-trauma.

The characters are well-enough drawn: a young woman who is shot and the two young men who are injured trying to rescue her. The story, however, wanders a little into other areas and away from the original story. Of course, the characters would go on with their lives, but why introduce the campus shooting at all if it is not really going to inform the book later?

I perhaps should have been more generous;the tale of life afterwards is interesting and full of life, but it just didn't totally work for me.

[Marcy Aman · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am not really sure how to rate this book, because my feelings vary about it. I absolutely loved the beginning, and hated the second half of the book. The entire section where all the characters were at Deliah and Jack's house was ridiculously drawn out and incredibly boring. I feel as though the author could have cut out 100 pages and it would have been a much better book.
However, I really really loved the first part of this book. The parts where Wyatt and Shelly were in love were beautifully written, and her entire pregnancy fascinated me. I felt as though once dan and Madeline came along, the book started it's downfall.

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Late in the morning on Monday, August 1, 1966, former Marine Charles Whitman carried an arsenal of weapons to the top of the clock tower on the University of Texas campus in Austin, took aim from the observation deck, and began shooting. By the time he was done, fifteen people lay dead and many more wounded. Elizabeth Crook’s novel, Monday, Monday, opens on that fateful day, with student Shelly Maddox leaving her math class, going outside and setting off across the plaza, where her life is forever altered when she is hit by one of Whitman’s bullets. Two other students, Wyatt Calvert and Jack Stone, who are cousins, see what is happening and do what they can to help the wounded, Shelly among them, even as bullets continue to rain down. Crook’s novel expands outward from these interactions: Wyatt cradling Shelly in his arms sheltering her from further injury, Jack being wounded as he tries to help someone else. Afterward, survivors of the shooting struggle to recover and resume lives brutally interrupted. But Shelly, single, and Wyatt, married, discover their shared experience has bound them inextricably together. It is an exclusive bond: in each other, they discover something that no one else will ever understand. The attraction is magnetic and physical, and Shelly soon finds that she is pregnant. The story that follows encompasses many lives and unspools over several decades. Shelly, Wyatt and Jack move in different directions and build separate lives, but their decisions ensure they will always remain linked. Crook’s characters don’t always behave admirably: their actions can be selfish and wilful and sometimes result in others getting hurt. Inevitably, there comes a time when secrets harboured for decades must, for the good of everyone and despite the consequences, be dragged into the light of day. The novel tells a multi-generational story filled with flawed, haunted characters who have suffered and triumphed but who ultimately come face to face with a distressing dilemma. Readers will find that Crook is a supremely empathetic writer, able to inhabit multiple points of view and do so convincingly. She is also a writer who unashamedly skirts the edges of melodrama but, for the most part, avoids tugging unduly at heartstrings. In Monday, Monday Elizabeth Crook has conjured a suspenseful and emotionally fraught story with an engaging historical backdrop that depicts in vividly dramatic terms the profound impact that random acts can have on peoples’ lives, and how the echoes of trauma reverberate through the years.

[Cheryl · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book starts out very powerful. It actually was almost hard to read the shooting scene with all that is happening currently in the world. Although, this scene and the first part of the story is the most important. This is where I as the reader really connects with Shelly, Wyatt, and Jack. Their lives are changed forever and they share a bond for life. W

While the beginning was filled with a lot of fast moving action, I still only read about a few chapters at a time. However I still plugged along reading. Once I got about a third of the way into the book did I than just really spend some time reading this book and I flew through it than. I could not read it fast enough. The way that Shelly, Wyatt, and Jack grew up and connected with each other on many different levels was an emotional roller coaster. I thought the ending was a good one. I almost did not want this book to end. A must read.

[Melissa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Started very strong as a gripping true crime novel and love story, but slowly went downhill. Writing is strong but it almost seems like two different writers contributed.

Deteriorated into boring, drawn out scenes. The 40 year tedious family drama made me not care much anymore. Final scene waiting to tell Carlotta was excruciatingly The first half of the novel is worth a read but then you can move on - when you find yourself getting bored, just quit - there is nothing more to see.

[Amber · Rating 2 out of 5]

Initially this book captivated me. I was interested in the story and the characters but as I kept reading it became obvious where the story was going. Events were set up to become predicable coincidences later and I was sick of reading how all these fantastic and good things came from a horrible event in our history.

[Jeff · Rating 2 out of 5]

I became interested in reading the book when I read that it was set on the day, and the aftermath, of a mass shooting at the University of Texas in the early '60s.
I can't say I was very impressed. The prose is no more than workmanlike, the characters author Crook created are not very compelling, and the major "plot twist" of the novel was just ho-hum.

[David Ward · Rating 3 out of 5]

Monday, Monday by Elizabeth Crook (Sarah Crichton Books 2014) (Fiction)(3480).

Author Elizabeth Crook has adopted the historic events of August 1, 1966 in Austin Texas as the entry point for her novel Monday, Monday. This was the day on which an apparently deranged ex-Marine sharpshooter and Eagle Scout named Charles Whitman stabbed to death his wife and his mother and then took a trunkload of guns and ammunition along with food enough for several meals to the twenty-eighth floor observation deck atop the Texas Tower on the University of Texas-Austin campus. For more than an hour Whitman picked off random pedestrians from his perch. He killed a total of thirteen that day and wounded thirty-one others before he was himself shot and killed by law enforcement officers.

Elizabeth Crook's tale opens with a UT student named Shelly crossing the tower plaza at the moment that the sniper opened fire from above. When Shelly is shot and wounded, a pair of cousins named Jack and Wyatt heroically attempt to come to her rescue. Jack is also shot and wounded while giving aid.

These three characters are at the core of Monday, Monday. It is a tale of unrequieted love, of family, and most of all, a story of forgiveness. Elizabeth Crook spins an engaging yarn across several generations of family.

I was impressed that the author left no dangling loose ends in her telling of this story. The scope and breadth of this novel demanded that the author had ready a litany of supporting characters. I was pleased to find that the author neatly tied up every loose end and loose character before the conclusion of the tale.

This is a finely-wrought piece of fiction. I look forward to reading the rest of Elizabeth Crook's offerings.

My rating: 7/10, finished 11/21/20 (3480). I have a hardcover copy inscribed by the author that was a gift. HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

[Margo Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a compelling novel! Books like this make me wish I was still in a book club, because this story needs to be discussed with fellow readers!

The main topic I'd like to discuss: Does grief give you the right to behave any way you want? Say and do anything you want? Really?

This book is very much about how various people cope with the grief encountered in life ... succumbing to it, regretting it, muddling through it, and finally overcoming it. We all handle it differently. Do we have any right to judge others and the way they handle it?

For example, Crook writes:

""Look what I've done," he said. "You trusted me, and look what I've done." He had come to her aid, and then he had wrecked her life."

- and -

""I don't want to live my whole life knowing that my fears might come true, and just hoping for them not to." Shelly didn't answer for a moment before saying, "But that's what most of us do. And if they do come true, we survive and then walk down the middle of whatever road we choose then.""

But don't worry!!

This book isn't only about grief, it is also very much about LOVE: the types of love we allow ourselves to receive from others, the types of love we allow ourselves to give to others, and the type of love that sustains us and moves us to better lives.

Elizabeth Crook's writing is beautiful, and she has an amazing ability to paint the scene and show the reader the action. The beginning and the ending sections of this book were by far my favorites. The middle slowed quite a bit in some places with a lot of "telling" rather than "showing" scenes. However, to cover the spans of time in this multi-generational book, I'm not quite sure how Crook could have accomplished it otherwise. Also in the middle there seemed to be some scenes that felt like "fillers" to me. Again, this is something I'd like to discuss with a book club (if only I was in one! ha). I'd like to ask if they thought the scenes were relevant to the plot or not. And frankly, the muddle in the middle is the only reason I knocked this book's rating from five stars to four stars. Everything else was great. Crook even made me cry multiple times!

This is a story that will linger in my mind for a while.

There is sexuality and violence in this book, but nothing mind-shattering. The language is very clean; I can only recall a couple of cuss words. Definitely a book I'd let my mother read. *wink* Oh, and then I'd have someone to discuss it with! Very good idea.

[Patty · Rating 5 out of 5]

Monday, Monday: A Novel
By
Elizabeth Crook


What I knew about this book before I read it...

I knew that this book was about the shootings that occurred from the top of a tower at a Texas university. I knew, also, that the author was going to imaginatively and creatively expand on the lives of three key characters involved in this tragedy.

My thoughts after reading this book...

Shelly, Wyatt, and Jack were on campus the day Charles Whitman fired at students from a tower at the university. Shelly was injured. Wyatt and Jack tried to rescue her. Jack was shot. When Wyatt got to Shelly all that he could do was to hold on to try to keep her alive. Many things happened during the following years...marriages, children...but the most significant event was the affair that Shelly and Wyatt had and the daughter that was born because of that affair. I should mention that Charles Whitman and the shootings really happened but the rest of the book is solely the author's inventive story.

These three people and their families stay in touch through these years...but the pivotal issue is that Shelly and Wyatt's daughter is adopted by Jack and his wife and Shelly is able to remain in her daughter's life.

What I loved about this book...

There is much much more to this book than I have relayed in my brief thoughts. Relationships are complex and complicated. Relationships overlap. Carlotta...the adopted daughter...doesn't really know about her parents until she is in her late thirties but she has such a wonderful relationship with Shelly that she never really focuses on finding her birth mother. When the truth is finally told to everyone...there are repercussions that might cause everyone's lives to change.


Final thoughts about this book...

This book was beautifully written. I loved learning about how these people dealt with such a traumatic incident. The characters felt real. Their emotions felt real. I really just loved this book. It was joyful. It was sad. It is memorable.

[Marie]

Monday, Monday started off with so much promise. The Charles Whitman shooting at the University of Texas was described in horrifying detail. I could imagine myself there - feel the heat coming off the pavement, hear the gunshots ringing through the mall, smell the blood. It was gruesome and terrifying, leaving me with high hopes for the rest of the book. Unfortunately, with the exception of one other horrific experience during the course of the book, the story fell flat for me.

There was very little character development in Monday, Monday. The characters were dull and one-dimensional. I think this probably had to do with the fact the book jumped around so much and we never stayed in one time period for long. The book took place over the course of forty years and jumped ahead frequently, sometimes small jumps, sometimes huge jumps. A jumble of things happened during those forty years; in the beginning, some of it was interesting, but as the book went on, I found myself thinking a lot of the story was pointless. Not only that, but there would be vivid descriptions of some things - sometimes almost too much description - and then little to no description of other things. The book had more telling than showing, and other than the two big events in the book, I couldn’t picture the things that were happening or the people they were happening to. Paired with dialogue that was often stilted and awkward, it made for a jarring read.

The ending left me completely disappointed. After reading about forty years of random series of events, I hoped the ending would redeem the story as a whole, but it was lackluster, leaving me with a feeling of ‘what did I just read?’ I realize happy endings aren’t always necessarily believable, but it would have been nice if someone in this large cast of characters had ended up happy. Instead of a feeling of hope or closure or anything positive, I just felt depressed.

[Bonnie Brody · Rating 4 out of 5]

The opening pages of Monday Monday are both horrific and gripping. I was immediately hooked. The novel begins with the shootings from the bell tower at the University of Texas at Austin in 1966, by Charles Whitman. People are dropping like flies as this ex-marine and marksman shoots from the top of the tower at the people on the mall below. Before shooting people at the university, Whitman had killed his wife and mother.

One of the injured is Shelly, a student who leaves her math class in order to buy some Tampons at a local Rexall. She is shot through her arm and breast. Two graduate students, and cousins to one another, Jack and Wyatt, decide to run into the shooting spree to try and save those who are still alive. Jack is a Vietnam vet and may have felt he could dodge the bullets. They get to Shelly and, in the midst of saving her, Jack gets seriously wounded. Shelly and Jack both live and this connection, on the mall, creates a long-lasting union between the three that lasts for decades.

Both Jack and Wyatt are married. Wyatt is an artist who paints primarily in tempera. Shelly dreams of going into the Peace Corps. However, she and Wyatt begin an affair and a child is conceived. How their lives intermingle, what secrets they share, how their lives change, and how they all are conjoined by the past is the theme of this novel.

While I couldn't wait to turn the pages, I was bothered by the frequent use of dark premonitions to warn the reader that something bad was about to happen. It reminded me of dystonic music played during a movie to let the viewer know that a nerve-racking scene is about to occur. Elizabeth Crook has a great way with words and knows how to write a compelling novel, one that holds the reader captive. For this, I give her kudos.

[Dana Wilkes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Monday, Monday was not quite what I had expected, but I enjoyed it all the same. From the jacket description, I thought it would have more about the psychological effects of the UT Tower shooting. That's not a criticism -- just a statement that it's not quite what I had expected. I'm a Central Texas native, born a few years after the shooting (using the characters as a timeline, I was born in between Carlotta and Madeline). The tower has always had a haunted quality for me because access to it was so severely restricted during my childhood. I remember vividly walking across campus to a Longhorn football game and looking up at the tower, asking my parents if we could ever go up to the top, and them replying no, adding in hushed tones, "Because of the shooter." And then they would leave it at that. It was a taboo subject that no one really wanted to discuss, especially in the shadow of the tower. Crook does an excellent job of capturing that pervasive sense of loss and tragedy that I have always associated with that place on the campus. Some of the characters were not as fleshed out as I would have liked them to be, and there were a few things in the plot that were spelled out and explained a little too directly for my taste. If not for those small things, I would have given it 5 stars.

[Martin Kohout · Rating 4 out of 5]

Disclaimer: Elizabeth Crook is a friend/acquaintance, but I honestly loved this book. It follows the lives of three young people who were on the University of Texas campus on August 1, 1966, when Charles Whitman barricaded himself at the top of the UT Tower with a small arsenal and began shooting people at random. Whitman's shooting spree killed 16 and wounded 32; Crook has imagined the life of Shelly, one of Whitman's victims, and the cousins Wyatt and Jack, who heroically rescue her as she lies bleeding on the pavement. But the sensational, horrific beginning gives way to a thoughtful examination of the way the lives of these three young people become inextricably tangled over the ensuing decades. While I thought the book sometimes veered into melodrama, I was totally willing to forgive that, because I was completely caught up in the story of three good, well-meaning people whose actions have unforeseen and unintended consequences.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

The bones of this story have so much potential. Taking a popular 1960s song from the Mamas and the Papas, Elizabeth Crook frames a fictional story about the University of Texas Massacre in 1966 and its impact on Shelly, one of the female students who was wounded. The massacre, however, is only relevant at the beginning of the story and midway through, it could easily be forgotten that it ever happened. The attraction and relationship between Wyatt (her rescuer at the shooting) and Shelly seems unbelievable at times and lacks deep chemistry between the characters. There is way too much description of irrelevant events in the story that can easily be skipped or skimmed over just to get to the important currents within the storyline. I liked it enough to want to finish it...but was disappointed in the end. After I finished the story, I watched a short video on the massacre to learn more about it. This helped me to see the true horror of the event more than the book.

[Farrah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book, despite major issues I had with the narration and writing. It led me to read more about the shooting at UT and Charles Whitman. I had a hard time with how unrealistic and nicely tied together the plot was. It felt too contrived. I also had a hard time with the narration of the story over a long period of time. The time chunks didn't tie together as nicely as I would have liked. At the same time, there were some really raw human emotions she was able to evoke in me that I appreciated. She dealt with some tough issues and showed the human side of those issues. I really loved the Austin setting and the familiarity of home I felt as I read.

[Amy Keane · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book because I live in Austin, Texas, and it was on the mayor's "book club" list. I finished it just before the 48th anniversary of the UT Tower shooting, which happened on Aug. 1, 1966. Years ago I read another great book by Elizabeth Crook called The Raven's Bride, about Sam Houston's short marriage to a white woman, a big mistake since he preferred Cherokee ways and also had a Cherokee wife. Anyway, back to Monday, Monday. I became emotionally involved with the characters and found the setting and progression through the years interesting. I sometimes felt angry at or critical of the characters, but I definitely couldn't put the book down.

[Sharmyn (Lumsden) Lilly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Crook deftly wove several riveting life stories around the Whitman University of Texas tower mass murder. In Austin, many of the city's current residents know someone who was on campus that day, if not hiding in harm's way or injured or killed. Several books have been written about the incident, but Crook's novel really humanizes and personalizes the story for those of us who only heard about it from wherever we lived before we moved to Austin. I'll never look at the tower in the same way again. Crook is a masterful writer, and I will seek out her other books.

[Ayne Ray · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book started out so promising, and was absolutely gripping in its description of the real-life Texas Tower shootings by Charles Whitman at the University of Texas and its aftermath. But then it started to go downhill, and by the end I was so much less invested in the characters and the story. The whole section with all the characters at Delia and Jack's house was incredibly drawn out and much less of a payoff than I was expecting. An unfortunate second half to an otherwise initially interesting and engaging book.