“This is a book that readers will find dear to their hearts. Lunch Ladies will make you laugh, cry, and cheer with its quirky characters. This is a beautifully written novel about relationships, friendships, togetherness, and loneliness.”

A quiet, reflective novel about aging, regret, and community

Shelia, Coralene, and Crystal all work at the Hanley School District’s lunch department, managing the cafeterias of elementary through high schools in the area. As summer of 1976 nears, they are tasked with coming up with ideas for food to be served at the bicentennial parade, marking the two-hundred-year anniversary of the United States. 

But Crystal spends her days obsessing over obituaries of strangers, Coralene has a nephew who needs her help, and Shelia’s tendency toward isolation is pulling her into her thoughts more and more. The lunch ladies and the people around them, both family and friends, reckon with their daily lives, their lost loves, and the loved ones who need their help as the parade nears.

Crystal, Coralene, and Shelia are all wonderfully complex characters with fully fleshed out voices that make switching between their perspectives easy to follow. It’s even easier to root for them. In other cases, things like Crystal’s obsession with obituaries or Shelia’s intense isolation might be off-putting, but here, it only makes them more endearing. The book gives middle-aged women a place to be themselves, odd or sad or tragic as they may be. They are allowed to grieve the lives they left behind, the paths they didn’t follow, the futures uncertain ahead of them. It’s a somber book sometimes, more than I expected, but it’s a welcome, soft kind of somber. Not accusatory or devastating, but a gentle undercurrent. 

This is a story that makes you reflect on your own life, your own losses, your own dreams you may have left behind. It’s a comfort to know others feel the same way, even if they are characters in a book. Others who grieve the same way, yearn the same way, regret the same way you do.

“She named this weight. It was the loneliness one, made heavier by layers of regret.”

The writing is sharp and not always in a somber way. While most of the emotion of the novel comes from reflection and grief, there is humor mixed in—like with the lunch ladies’ boss sending memos constantly about dog shows his dog is competing in. It balances the heaviness of the narrative well as do the soft moments of connection and of community as they prepare for the bicentennial parade.

“Her life had backfilled with the futility of hope: that someone else would clean up the kitchen, take out the garbage, or bring her a second cup of coffee.”

The pacing is on the slower side, more slice-of-life than a story hurtling toward a climax. While the goal of the women is to get through the bicentennial, most of the narrative is investigating their lives, their pasts, and the people they interact with. Often, characters from one woman’s storyline appear in another, weaving them together to form a sort of narrative community. The point of view mostly stays with Shelia, Crystal, or Coralene but sometimes jumps to another of the smaller characters like the waitress that serves Shelia at Denny’s. This can be jarring at times but adds a layer of richness to the setting and to the narrative as they, too, deal with their own lives, losses, and griefs.

“Two roads will always diverge, it’s who we travel with that makes all the difference.”

Lunch Ladies radiates warmth as the women navigate their relatively average lives like the rest of us, full of complexity and loss and regrets that we’ve all felt before. It’s a truly well-written, reflective novel perfect for a book club or a rainy Sunday morning.

Lunch Ladies
Jodi Thompson Carr
Century House Press
979-8-9915682-0-3         $14.99 Paperback/$3.99 ebook
Website: www.jodithompsoncarr.com
Ordering: https://www.amazon.com/Lunch-Ladies-Jodi-Thompson-Carr-ebook/dp/B0DKPJFRKK

 Lunch Ladies is a novel about women’s friendships, community involvement, and 1976 politics and social circles in Hanley, Minnesota. It follows the changing lives and perspectives of a circle of women who find themselves pulled into a community July celebration. Each woman already has her plate full, so tapping these school district “lunch ladies” seems an overloaded situation.

 Despite the added and unwelcome workload, however, each woman is motivated to participate and support their community, because Hanley is a place where:

 …most have called Hanley home for generations. Why would they leave? Among them are Crystal, Coralene, and Sheila; their families, friends, and co-workers; the people who died and left them; and the people who died and didn’t.

 The story opens with Crystal’s habit of reading obituaries as she sits on a park bench alongside a stranger. She imagines this richly-dressed woman could have been a match for the late Roger Remington Squirrel … but apparently she’s already taken by an “aging Clark Kent.” So, her fantasy stops here.

 Jodi Thompson Carr alternates viewpoints between the ladies. This solidifies personalities that approach people and problems from disparate angles, creating a satisfying shift in perspectives that gives Lunch Ladies a full-bodied flavor of adventure and discovery as each woman navigates family, hurt feelings, anger, and new options.

 This allows readers to examine clashes and encounters from different vantage points:

 How was Darcy supposed to respond if this was going to be Crystal’s approach? God dammit. She was always the one left to handle things. Always… How quickly the tables had turned. Help Crystal out? What the hell?”

 How the women and their community join together to overcome obstacles and contribute their talents to the greater good creates a heartwarming story that captures relationships, growth, and tragedy in an enlightening atmosphere readers will find engrossing. Especially notable are the disparate paths each woman chooses in her life, and how these are influenced by the attitudes of and encounters with others.

 Discussion points at the novel’s end make for perfect pointers for book clubs and reading groups interested in a closer examination of small-town relationships in general and women’s transformations in particular. Added value comes in the form of wry humor injected throughout the story.

 Libraries seeking a beach read about evolving relationships, community participation, and the special challenges of aging and illness will find Lunch Ladies a compelling recommendation about revised relationships and growth, whether these connections be friends, family, or romantic possibilities.

Lunch Ladies by Jodi Thompson Carr is an ensemble story following multiple connected characters. Crystal works in the school district’s lunch department and organizes a contest for elementary students to help distribute cookies at the Fourth of July parade. She also has a unique hobby: making matches between the living and the dead. Coralene manages the hot dog stand for the parade and frets about her nephew Tanner, who she's determined must return home. Sheila prepares for the parade as she grieves the loss of a past love. The older, widowed Leonora is on hand to help organize the float for the parade with a group of other elderly women. The parade itself becomes the backdrop for personal reckonings, family flare-ups, and community involvement as each character faces their own set of challenges.

Lunch Ladies by Jodi Thompson Carr is a finely crafted and thoughtful look at the problems that bind us within our seemingly mundane, everyday lives. Carr’s writing is sympathetic in its portrayals, intelligently pulling together these individuals authentically and organically. Tanner was the most interesting to me, and as a parent, I felt an element of protectiveness when he saw something pretty tough to witness. This is a character-driven story, but Carr's keen eye for detail concerning the importance of the parade elevates what would have felt mundane in the hands of a less skilled writer. Instead, she's able to make it into something really special. Overall, this is a wonderful, emotionally resonant tale with a relatable, well-observed narrative that rewards readers with its quiet strength and wisdom. Very highly recommended.

“Lunch Ladies will keep readers entertained from cover to cover. Rich with witty dialogue and the ups and downs that come with friends and family, this is a wonderful book that many will enjoy. Kudos to Author Jodi Thompson Carr for creating a masterpiece full of emotion, love, warmth, and life.”