Three Women

Three Women is one of my favourite books. A book that I can read again and again. These stories of three women each of their time gets to you. You are there and you feel you know them, you understand why they react to whatever happens to them as they do. You laugh, you cry, and you rebel with them - and enjoy their personal successes. The stories are finely balaced in drama and humor as the various characters are portraied with a great knowledge of human nature and a lot of self-irony.

Something about these stories has brought me back to this collection time and time again. Rafe and Nialla's story caught my eye when I read through the book in the library, and I immediately went out and purchased a copy! All three stories reflect this talented writer's development, and focus on times and places that are currently beyond our reach. These are tender, enthralling tales, and show that Ms. McCaffrey does not need fantasy worlds in order to spin a great tale!

This was a fascinating book, one that I have reread many times. In the three stories you can see the personal growth and writing ability of the author evolve. The first story deals with the WWII era and the heroine is a plucky, independent (but careful not to be too independent) young woman. The story reflects the situation of women of the time - marry and raise a family, no career. The second story, written I would guess in 70's, involves a woman with a career, who ends up with a guy who's going to be head of the family and major decision-maker with her as handy dandy, qualified helper-but-not-quite-equal partner. The 3rd story (written in late 70's or early 80's I would guess)is of a emotionally-abused wife, now divorced, with 2 teenagers, who goes to Ireland. She's more independent than the 1st two and becomes more independent still in Ireland but still able to make the story into a romantic novel (with a real plot I must add!). If you find it, buy it and send! ! me another copy too! Linda Zoldoske

Three women, three gentle stories, filled with personal memories of times before most of us were born. A story about horses and drugs before drugs were all-pervasive leads to in improbable romance between a young woman and a short guy! World War II and a great dog and young woman with a man's name come together with a recuperating veteran and stolen art works. A divorcee goes to Ireland for her inheritance and falls in love with the land and an Irishman while her two children become acclimated to a different sort of life. This must have come from the author's observations--the places are real, the people may be. Throughout them all, Anne McCaffrey enchants the reader--without dragons, without Pern, without telepathy. These were written from her heart.