Major Pettigrew's Last Stand

 Book 108 of my 2023 Reading Challenge

read from November 6 - 25

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand

by Helen Simonson

Summary (via the book jacket)

In the small village of Edgecombe St. Mary in the English countryside lives Major Ernest Pettigrew (retired), the unlikely hero of Helen Simonson's wondrous debut. Wry, courtly, opinionated, and completely endearing, the Major leads a quiet life valuing the proper things that Englishmen have lived by for generations: honor, duty, decorum, and a properly brewed cup of tea. But then his brother's death sparks an unexpected friendship with Mrs. Jasmina Ali, the Pakistani shopkeeper from the village. Drawn together by their shared love of literature and the loss of their spouses, the Major and Mrs. Ali soon find their friendship blossoming into something more. But village society insists on embracing him as the quintessential local and regarding her as the permanent foreigner. Can their relationship survive the risks one takes when pursuing happiness in the face of culture and tradition?

My Opinion

3 stars

Apparently older men with a gruff exterior that melts away to a soft interior, usually with the encouragement of a precocious child, is my bread and butter.  The pages passed by in a blink and I was all in and rooting for the Major and Mrs. Ali.

3 stars isn't a bad rating but what kept this from being higher, especially when I'm so drawn to this concept, is all the extra subplots.  It felt like so many problems in so many directions - the gun, the son, the land, the child, the club, the family, etc. - that it kept me on edge and then to have so many problems all resolve with few consequences (and most in a few sentences, such as Alice and the Lord showing up to the wedding together) left me unsatisfied.