Book Talk: ‘Lizzie Blake’s Best Mistake’ turns up heat
“A Brush with Love,” the debut romance by Bay Village native Mazey Eddings, featured Harper, a dental student with an anxiety disorder that caused her to have incapacitating panic attacks. In Eddings’ new book, “Lizzie Blake’s Best Mistake,” Harper’s friend, a baker, has a “sticky brain.”
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That’s how she thinks of her attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Lizzie goes from one job to another and can’t decide on a flavor at the ice cream stand. She forgets to take her medication and has never spent more than one night with a man, preferring hookups arranged through dating apps.
She’s waiting at a bar for an overdue rendezvous and meets Rake, an Australian in town for a work assignment. They’re planning to leave together when her original date shows up, drunk and insulting. Rake puts him in his place, and he and Lizzie spend the night at his hotel.
Make that a night and a day. Lizzie is startled when Rake asks for her number and aghast when he invites her to lunch. When he goes back to Australia, she expects that she’ll never talk to him again, and she doesn’t until she calls him to tell him she’s pregnant.
They decide to move in together and be “platonic co-parents.” Lizzie has a self-described “scatterbrained nature.” Her parents, especially her mother, are viciously critical, making her feel unloved. Rake is disciplined, and his parents are warm and supportive.
While “A Brush with Love” had erotic scenes, “Lizzie Blake” increases the steam level to explicit. A special appeal is the group of friends, continuing from the first book, who offer comic relief and unyielding support.
“Lizzie Blake’s Best Mistake” (366 pages, softcover) costs $16.99 from St. Martin’s Press. Mazey Eddings is a dentist who lives in Philadelphia. Her next book, “The Plus One,” set for an April release, is about Lizzie’s roommate Indira and her “fake date” for a wedding.
‘Symptoms’
The coronavirus has taken a toll on us all, and it can be difficult to express the frustration and stress brought on by the extended pandemic. David Thomas, a mental health case manager from Alliance, has taken on the assignment in “Symptoms: Poems written by a frontline mental health worker during the Covid 19 Pandemic.”
Some of the untitled poems speak to the loneliness and alienation of essential workers, with lines like “Everyone’s talking but no one is listening.” In many others, Thomas reveals his search for a romantic partner, fretting that “I want to be cool like Colin Firth” or, later, “like Dracula, with hypnotic eyes that put you under my spell.” “You” seems to be a hoped-for future partner, and there are repeated appeals: “I’m going to steal your heart”; “I want to grow old with you … If things go south I’ll stay with you.”
Aside from a few references to Washington and poverty, there is nothing political here; it’s personal, almost cathartic. “Even though we’re all wearing masks / Our fear and worry about our lives is still very readable on each face.”
The poems show impressive depth, but their number can be overwhelming.
“Symptoms” (216 pages, softcover) costs $25 from online retailers. A second collection, “Hells Angel,” is available.
Events
Loganberry Books (13015 Larchmere Blvd., Shaker Heights): Kit Whipple signs “Cleveland’s Colorful Characters,” 1 p.m. Sunday.
Geauga Library (Thompson branch, 6645 Madison Road): Melissa Crandall discusses “Elephant Speak: A Devoted Keeper’s Life Among the Herd,” about Roger Henneous, the longtime elephant keeper at Portland’s Washington Park Zoo, 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Monday. From 6 to 7 p.m. Thursday, Ruth Hanford Morhard signs “Mrs. Morhard and the Boys,” about the Cleveland predecessor of Little League Baseball. Register at geaugalibrary.net.
Stark County District Library (Jackson Community Branch, 7487 Fulton Drive NW, Jackson Township): Don Ake talks about and signs his humor book “Turkey Terror at My Door!”, 6 to 7:45 p.m. Wednesday.
Stark County District Library (Perry Sippo branch, 5710 12th Street NW, Perry Township): Neil Zurcher will sign “Ten Ohio Disasters,” “The Best of One Tank Trips” and his other books, 6 to 7:30 p.m. Thursday. Register at starklibrary.org.
Medina County District Library (Brunswick branch, 3649 Center Road): Dayton author Jess Montgomery, whose “Kinship” series is inspired by a real-life female sheriff in Appalachia, talks about the fourth book, “The Echoes,” 6:30 to 8 p.m. Thursday.
Dover Public Library (525 N. Walnut St.): Historian Seth Angel talks about “Understanding Historic Schoenbrunn Village: A Field Guide to the Moravian Delaware Village called Mellhik Thùppèck,” 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Thursday. Register at doverlibrary.org.
Stow-Munroe Falls Public Library: Hernan Diaz, whose 2017 novel “In the Distance” was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, joins the Online Author Talk series at 9 p.m. Thursday. Register at smfpl.org.
Akron-Summit County Public Library (North Hill branch, 183 E. Cuyahoga Falls Ave.): Palestinian-American poet Noor Hindi reads from her collection “Dear God, Dear Bones, Dear Yellow,” 6 to 7 p.m. Thursday. The library notes that there may be explicit language. Register at akronlibrary.org.
Hudson Library & Historical Society: Tilar J. Mazzeo discusses “Sisters in Resistance: How a German Spy, a Banker’s Wife, and Mussolini’s Daughter Outwitted the Nazis” in a virtual appearance at 7 p.m. Thursday. Register at hudsonlibrary.org.
Cuyahoga County Public Library (South Euclid-Lyndhurst branch, 1876 S. Green Road, South Euclid): Nigerian-American writer Hafizah Augustus Geter talks about her memoir “The Black Period: On Personhood, Race, and Origin” with novelist A.E. Osworth (“We Are Watching Eliza Bright”), 7 to 8 p.m. Thursday. Register at cuyahogalibrary.org.
Music Box Supper Club (1148 Main Ave., Cleveland): “The Mount Rushmore of Cleveland TV News,” Paul Orlousky, author of “Punched, Kicked, Spat On and Sometimes Thanked: Memoirs of a Cleveland TV News Reporter,” along with Carl Monday and Leon Bibb, join the Cleveland Stories Dinner Party series, 7 p.m. Thursday. Dinner is $20; the lecture is free. Go to musicboxcle.com.
Mac’s Backs (1820 Coventry Road, Cleveland Heights): Danny Caine signs “How to Resist Amazon and Why: The Fight for Local Economics, Data Privacy, Fair Labor, Independent Bookstores, and a People-Powered Future!”, 7 to 8 p.m. Friday.
Plan ahead: Advance notice for two events sure to be popular: Author and advocate Temple Grandin (“The Autistic Brain: Thinking Across the Spectrum”) will be at the Akron-Summit County Public Library on Oct. 24, and Cleveland native Celeste Ng (“Little Fires Everywhere”) will be at the Parma-Snow branch of Cuyahoga County Public Library on Oct. 27.
Season tickets are on sale for the 2022-2023 William N. Skirball Writers Center Stage Series, to be held at the Maltz Performing Arts Center. Writers include Barbara Kingsolver, Jonathan Franzen and Gary Shteyngart. See the schedule at cuyahogalibrary.org.
Email information about books of local interest, and event notices at least two weeks in advance to BeaconBookTalk@gmail.com and bjnews@thebeaconjournal.com. Barbara McIntyre tweets at @BarbaraMcI.
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This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: ‘Lizzie Blake’s Best Mistake’ is steamy novel from Mazey Eddings
