Consequences by Penelope Lively

This is a beautifully written novel, however, it was not very satisfying. After the first two main characters died, everyone else seemed somewhat the same and sadly, forgettable. Maybe I never forgave the author for killing off Matt and Lorna. I had to slog through to finish. I'll have to try the Book Award winner...

Here's the publisher's blurb
A chance meeting in St. James's Park begins young Lorna and Matt's intense relationship. Wholly in love, they leave London for a cottage in a rural Somerset village. Their intimate life together-Matt's woodcarving, Lorna's self-discovery, their new baby-is shattered with the arrival of World War II. In 1960s London, Molly happens upon a forgotten newspaper-a seemingly small moment that leads to her first job and, eventually, a pregnancy by a wealthy man who wants to marry her, but whom she does not love. Thirty years later, Ruth, who has always considered her existence a peculiar accident, questions her own marriage and begins a journey that takes her back to 1941-and a redefinition of herself, and of love. Told in Lively''s incomparable prose, Consequences is a powerful story of growth, death, and rebirth and a study of the previous century-its major and minor events, its shaping of public consciousness, and its changing of lives. "Her greatest gift, though, is her ability to see beyond mere cultural ephemera and grasp the unchanging essence of life.." - The Wall Street Journal "Her characters are beguiling, and her blend of romance and stinging social commentary is tonic." - Booklist (starred review) "A flawlessly constructed mini-epic." - The Telegraph "A beautifully written novel." - San Francisco Chronicle "A fine novel: intricate, heartbreaking and redemptive." - Publishers Weekly

Incident Report, by Martha Baillie

Initially, I thought this book would only appeal to people in the library field. The majority of"incidents" are Library examples, but as the book develops, other incidents surface and a complex and rich story develops.

The cover is painfully plain -- the death knoll for many works -- but it works for this work.

Publisher's blurb:
In a Toronto library, home to the mad and the marginalized, notes appear, written by someone who believes he is Rigoletto, the hunchbacked jester from Verdis opera. Convinced that the young librarian, Miriam, is his daughter, he promises to protect her from grief. Little does he know how much loss she has already experienced; or does he? The Incident Report, both mystery and love story, daringly explores the fragility of our individual identities. Strikingly original in its structure, comprised of 140 highly distilled, lyric reports, the novel depicts the tensions between private and public storytelling, the subtle dynamics of a socially exposed workplace. The Incident Report is a novel of gestures, one that invites the reader to be astonished by the circumstances its characters confront. Reports on bizarre public behaviour intertwine with reports on the private life of the novels narrator. Shifting constantly between harmony and dissonance, elegant in its restraint and excitingly contemporary, The Incident Report takes the pulse of our fragmented urban existence with detachment and wit, while a quiet tragedy unfolds.