Evenings at Five

by Gail Godwin

Book Overview

Every evening at five o’clock, Christina and Rudy stopped work and began the ritual commonly known as Happy Hour. Rudy mixed Christina’s drink with loving precision, the cavalier slosh of Bombay... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0345461029
• ISBN13: 9780345461025
• Release Date: April 2003
• Publisher: Ballantine Books
• Length: 114 Pages
• Weight: 0.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.0" x 7.7"

Customer Reviews

A Beatiful Tribue to Love

Gail Godwin, one of my all-time favorite authors, lost her long-time companion, composer Robert Starer, before writing this book as a tribute to him and their relationship. It is, in a word: Perfect. For anyone who has ever felt unbearable grief, or for anyone who has felt the same measure of real love, this book is a tribute to the best of the human spirit. I was lucky enough to have listened to the Audio version, which is read by the author herself, and her lightly southern-tinged pleasant voice adds a measure of poignancy she may or may not have intended. The fictional characters, Rudi and Christine, an author and a composer, live a life rich in every way, from their afternoon cocktail hour (preceded by a phone call from "Cope Paul," Rudi's fictional pontiff who urges them to have a drink) to their wide and wonderful collection of shared jokes, memories, people and most of all words...rich tapestries of words. Rudi is multi-lingual, and Christine is her willing foil. It sounds like it was the perfect relationship we all want and need, and its loss it made all the more so by the way Christine's reaction to her unspeakable loss. A truly beautiful book; I only wish I had seen the drawings that accompany the text, and will make sure I buy the book as well as the recording.

Gail Godwin writes with comforting precision.

I love Gail Godwin's clean, specific prose, and her thinly disguised (according to what I've read elsewhere) story of loss touched me. Her literate examination of (always imperfect) love is a joy, and I was surprised by how much I also embraced the collection of "Christina" stories in the latter half of this collection.

Midwest Book Review

What do Pope John Paul, a serrated knife fondly known as Ralph, and a bottle of gin have in common? Artfully, with humor and tenderness, Gail Godwin weaves the Pope, Ralph, and Bombay Sapphire gin into a loving testament. Every evening at five, Rudy builds his wife a drink with loving precision. and announces that "the Pope has called." Rudy is a composer and hears music; Christina is a writer lost in a world of words. But somehow, despite their differences, for 28 years their marriage works. When Rudy dies, his formidable presence no longer holds center stage in Christina's life. The gifted linguist and world traveller with a mellifluous voice "one octave below God's" is gone. Stripped of his presence, Christina is reduced to drinking her gin alone and conversing with Rudy's chair every evening at five. It's Christina's recollections of Rudy that makes Evenings at Five a standout. She reads his appointment diaries, kept through their years together, reliving the chronicle of his life. She listens to his music, composed one note on top of another until he reached a glorious symmetry - much like their life together. His is a powerful and lingering presence that defies death. Christina's memories are a delightful read, despite the sobering subject. Ms. Godwin's skill as best selling wordsmith proves itself once again in this latest book. Evenings at Five transcends death and loss, guiding each reader to an individual finale.

Surrounded by daily reminders of a life that is ?Nevermore?.

Because life is rarely without loss and grief, this slim novel may have wide appeal. However, this reader feels that the persons most attracted to and affected by "Evenings at Five" would have to be spouses for whom grief is still new, raw and ever present.It is amazing how so few words can so richly convey Christina's aching feelings. The simplicity of the book lies in the scarcity of words and the simple and stark pen drawings of the very articles that serve as constant reminders and reinforce the piercing emptiness and grief. A favorite tumbler; a metronome that is an integral tool to Rudy's composing skills; a richly-grained wooden chair with a beautiful, tapestried pillow; an answering machine with Rudy's voice that Christina cannot bring herself to erase.The chair keeps cropping up because Rudy, as his disease progressed, required sitting in an upright position and was probably all the more visible because of his forced confinement. Drawings, too, of the living room and descriptions of how they sat in proximity to one another, emphasize their closeness. They were woven together as a couple, as best friends, as collaborators in the co-creation of their home and individual work spaces...she an author...he a composer.Christina chronicles her pain without being mawkish. No matter where she turns, the memories are present and what makes the agony still worse is that on the night of Rudy's death, she had unsuspectingly left to return home and was reading as Rudy was dying. Sadly, she recalls that she will never be able to read that author again. No matter how many moments were spent together, from their grand passion when they first met, to the quieter times, the intimacy that grew over the years, there was never enough because it's now all gone...forever! It cannot be re-created.Religion is of some comfort to Christina, as are some friends, one of whom zeroes in on her drinking but it is in the seeking and in the finding of her own way that Christina can continue. And there are no easy answers, no and "she lived happily ever after". The final passage contains comforting words from Rudy, one of many things Christina recalls that he said. Memories are blissful, funny, poignant and pierce like a weapon!This is undoubtedly one of the most intimate books I have read on grief and loss. There are many on how to deal with grief; how to become financially capable; how to resume dating; how to tell children about the death of their parent but this one is truly unique in its ability to deal with the simple, pure aching that occurs when a loved one with whom one has shared so much is removed from one's life. It is like major surgery with no anesthesia during the surgery or painkillers to dull the agony following the procedure!

like falling in love all over again

Heart-breaking yet comforting -- exquisitely written, perfectly structured, emotionally precise. The illustrations poignantly echo the writing. I am buying extra copies for friends and family.