MARY JANE BY JESSICA ANYA BLAU

​Simply put, this is the perfect beach read. From the minute I started reading to the moment I finished I felt like the sun was shining on my shoulders. 

Rating: ★★★★
​Release Date: May 11, 2021
Genre: Historical Fiction (70s). Coming of Age. 
Series: None.
Pages: 335 pages
Format: Paperback. Source: ​Purchased.

Almost Famous meets Daisy Jones & The Six in this "delightful" (New York Times Book Review) novel about a fourteen-year-old girl’s coming of age in 1970s Baltimore, caught between her straight-laced family and the progressive family she nannies for—who happen to be secretly hiding a famous rock star and his movie star wife for the summer.

In 1970s Baltimore, fourteen-year-old Mary Jane loves cooking with her mother, singing in her church choir, and enjoying her family’s subscription to the Broadway Showtunes of the Month record club. Shy, quiet, and bookish, she’s glad when she lands a summer job as a nanny for the daughter of a local doctor. A respectable job, Mary Jane’s mother says. In a respectable house.

The house may look respectable on the outside, but inside it’s a literal and figurative mess: clutter on every surface, Impeachment: Now More Than Ever bumper stickers on the doors, cereal and ​

takeout for dinner. And even more troublesome (were Mary Jane’s mother to know, which she does not): the doctor is a psychiatrist who has cleared his summer for one important job—helping a famous rock star dry out. A week after Mary Jane starts, the rock star and his movie star wife move in.
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Over the course of the summer, Mary Jane introduces her new household to crisply ironed clothes and a family dinner schedule, and has a front-row seat to a liberal world of sex, drugs, and rock and roll (not to mention group therapy). Caught between the lifestyle she’s always known and the future she’s only just realized is possible, Mary Jane will arrive at September with a new idea about what she wants out of life, and what kind of person she’s going to be. ​

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READ MY BOOK REVIEW

​Simply put, this is the perfect beach read. From the minute I started reading to the moment I finished I felt like the sun was shining on my shoulders. I love a book that can transport its readers to wherever it may take place and Mary Jane brought me to Baltimore Maryland during the summer of 1970.

Mary Jane is a very light read and brings minimal drama. It’s a coming-of-age tale that follow the MC Mary Jane and the family that she is nannying for during the summer. During this short but meaningful stay with the Cone family and their summer guests Mary Jane learns so much about the world she lives in. She comes to realize that it isn’t as small or as narrow minded as her parents brought her up to believe. It’s a big world filled with all sorts of people, beliefs, and ethnicities. It’s a world where people are flawed, and a world were anything is possible. I found it to be thoughtful, tender, and immersive. All in all, I truly loved it.

If you’re looking for a beach read that feels more like a character study (but one that is extremely interesting and fun) then this is the perfect book for you. I was a bit confused at first when nothing was happening at first but when I got to the end, I realized that so much actually DID happen in the book, but it was very subtle. Sometimes an author can give her readers a story that truly moves them and makes them think without actually having to tell them to do so! This my friends, is that kind of book.

All in all, I truly enjoyed this one and would definitely recommend it.

𝗣𝗘𝗥𝗙𝗘𝗖𝗧 𝗙𝗢𝗥 𝗙𝗔𝗡𝗦 𝗢𝗙:
• Historical Fiction
• Coming of Age Tales
• Beach Reads

𝗠𝗬 𝗥𝗔𝗧𝗜𝗡𝗚: ⭐⭐⭐⭐