The days of Wine and Covid

by Elizabeth Berg

Even during the best of times, marriage can be a challenge. For Nan and Martin, this definitely is not the best of times. Trapped together while Covid rages, they do what they can to keep their sanity while keeping civil with each other. Nan holds her tongue when Martin sounds like a know-it-all, and Martin patiently waits out Nan’s stress-induced bouts of vertigo. They adopt a dog and give him a pandemic-inspired name—Divoc—that is as unsettling as it is funny. They doomwatch the news and find comfort in their shared political beliefs, so different from those of their next-door neighbor, Jerry. Clearly, Nan and Martin love and respect each other. But Nan has been keeping a secret, and when she finally tells Martin, their quarantine—and marriage—take a sudden and surprising turn.

Fans of Elizabeth Berg might recognize Nan and Martin from her bestselling novel The Pull of the Moon. In The Days of Wine and Covid, their marriage is thrown for a loop yet again, this time against the backdrop of a national crisis. Berg is unparalleled in her ability to capture the joys, sorrows, and comedy of everyday life, and to celebrate the relationships that bind us. With The Days of Wine and Covid, she reminds us that, despite our differences, we’re all in this together. It’s an optimistic and affirming capper to the challenging year that has been 2020.

Audiobook

Published January 1, 2020

About the author

Elizabeth Berg is an American novelist.
She was born in Saint Paul, Minnesota, and lived in Boston prior to her residence in Chicago. She studied English and Humanities at the University of Minnesota, but later ended up with a nursing degree. Her writing career started when she won an essay contest in Parents magazine. Since her debut novel in 1993, her novels have sold in large numbers and have received several awards and nominations, although some critics have tagged them as sentimental. She won the New England Book Awards in 1997.
The novels Durable Goods, Joy School, and True to Form form a trilogy about the 12-year-old Katie Nash, in part based on the author's own experience as a daughter in a military family. Her essay "The Pretend Knitter" appears in the anthology Knitting Yarns: Writers on Knitting, published by W. W. Norton & Company in November 2013.

Reviews

[Steph · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was another short story I’m not all that excited about. It’s been yeeeearrrrs since I’ve read a novel by Berg, and I used to love her work (mostly), so I thought I’d dip my toe back in to see if her novels were still my thing. And you know, I’m just not sure.
I don’t know who these MCs are, so that and the very short length of this short story made it very difficult for me to connect with these people. We are thrown in the middle of their dilemma (covid shutdown) with their patience already eroded and their tempers flaring, and that was a jolt. I was kind of bored throughout the short story, and thought it skipped around too much, and left too much else out. I didn’t mind the political mentions at all, like I’m sure quite a few of you readers did, so that wasn’t my issue at all…. But maybe I will give Berg another chance later on, with a regular sized novel.

The audiobook version of this novel was narrated by the author herself. This is sometimes a very risky move, as those authors don’t receive the kind of training that actual narrators get before starting this kind of work. That makes for bad narration. But I didn’t have to worry about this issue, here. Berg handled the narration, voice characterizations and emoting with aplomb and some talent there, too. I guess I wouldn’t mind her doing more narration for her other short stories in the future.

3 stars, and recommended. But only if you don’t mind a little politics, a lot of covid talk, and the like.

[Megan Derubeis · Rating 3 out of 5]

I felt like this shouldn’t have been a short story. There were some things that just felt rushed and not really resolved. Or not really necessary at all if they weren’t going to be developed. Bummer.

[Maria do Socorro Baptista · Rating 4 out of 5]

Uma narrativa que fala das dificuldades de um casal idoso durante a pandemia de Covid, envolvendo inclusive a questão política. Muito bom.