Lisa Vale, by Olive Higgins Prouty

This is the second in the series of novels that Olive Higgins Prouty wrote about the Boston Brahmin family the Vales. The titular character, Lisa Vale, is married to the oldest Vale son Rupert, and the sister-in-law of Charlotte (of Now, Voyager, the third in the series). I haven't come across too many heroines named Lisa!

Like Now, Voyager, this story opens on board a ship. Lisa is returning from an extended stay in Europe with her two daughters, Fabia and June. Fabia is secretly engaged to a young doctor, Dan Regan, who is socially and economically far beneath one of the "Boston Vales." Lisa has a secret of her own (this isn't a spoiler, it's explained in the first chapter - and it's not quite so secret as Lisa thinks it is). Her marriage to Rupert has never been a happy one, and she has been in love for years with Barry Firth, a partner in her husband's firm. Though their affair is an emotional one, not a physical one, Lisa is careful to keep everything in the proper bounds. She recently helped get Barry promoted to the Chicago office and away from Boston, but they still write to each other.

As if worry for her daughter and about Barry weren't enough, Lisa receives word that her elder son Rupert Junior (known as Windy in the family) has been arrested for drunk driving. There was a young woman in the car with him (like Dan Regan, she is not of their class). His father is apoplectic, particularly since Windy has just failed to get into Harvard. She is also worried about her second son, Murray, a frail boy who is struggling in school. At least her daughter June, about to make her debut, is enjoying it all and causing her mother no qualms.

Someone commented on my post about Dorothy Whipple's Greenbanks that it is "A very satisfying, a bit old-fashioned family story." I think the same could be said of this book. I had met most of these characters already in Now, Voyager. I already liked Lisa, who was such a good friend to her sister-in-law Charlotte. Here she is trying to balance her role as wife and mother with her own needs. I think she is a good mother, who loves her children and tries to support and help them, even when she disagrees with the choices they are making. While she plays her expected part as a wife, she stands up both to Rupert and his overbearing mother, Grandmother Vale. And she is very resourceful, in helping Windy out in his situation and in handling a financial setback with an unexpected pragmatism that I found charming. She deals with what is, rather than wasting time worrying or whining about what can't be helped.

As much as I liked Lisa, I found this book less satisfying than Now, Voyager. It didn't have the same impact as Charlotte's re-birth and growth into her own life. The story spends quite a bit of time with Fabia's romance, which I thought rather boring despite the drama (and then I knew from the later book how it turned out). I did enjoy this book though. Charlotte made several cameos - at one point Fabia declares that she won't be another Charlotte. I was glad to know how much happiness is ahead for her.

The fourth book in the series, Home Port, focuses on Lisa's younger son Murray (who seems to be the proverbial ninety-eight pound weakling). The library has already found me an inter-library loan of the fifth and last book, the elusive and expensive Fabia. I want to read them in order, and the ILL period is short, so I will be spending more time with the Vales in the near future.