Three Days in June by Anne Tyler
Published by Knopf Publishing Group
Publication date: February 11, 2025
Genres: Book Clubs, Fiction, Literary, Vacation Reading
Bookshop
Her daughter, Debbie, is getting married in three days and Gail Baines has been fired (or did she quit?) from her job so she’s irritable. Not to mention the fact that she wasn’t even invited to Debbie’s bridal spa day. This is Gail’s life when Three Days in June by Anne Tyler opens. But that’s not enough on the bingo card of her life. When she finally makes it to her quiet space of a home her ex-husband shows up to stay, uninvited for the wedding weekend because he’s fostering a cat and can’t stay with their daughter whose fiancé is allergic.
It’s important to note that Gail left her job—one way or another—because she was told she didn’t have good people skills. I’m not sure where I fall on that scale, but unannounced guests would be a problem for me so I’m on team Gail at this point. That the ex, Max, is an easygoing, even keel kind of person doesn’t help because Gail is not. She likes routine, rules, and structure and Max flouts all of them. So, when Debbie presents her parents with a moral quandary and then reaches a decision on her own, only Max is accepting. Gail wants to assert her parental authority and step in and is furious at what she sees as his disinterest in their daughter’s life..
By playing on the heightened tensions of wedding weekends Tyler provides Gail introspection into her own marriage and why it failed. With a compassionate lens she once again brings clarity to the muddiness of buried human emotion as slivers from Gail’s sharp edges peel off to reveal a softer side. There’s still plenty of starch in her personality,
“Sometimes when I find out what’s on other people’s minds I honestly wonder if we all live on totally separate planets.”
but Three Days in June is a reminder of the gentler aspects not so easily seen in the people around us.
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I heard many were disappointed in this one, but I loved it. Maybe because I also related to Gail.
Sitting right next to you, friend.