If you haven’t read Gail Godwin’s beautifully-written realistic novels about Southern women, you may have time to do so during lockdown.   In  her brilliant new novel, "Old Lovegood Girls," Godwin tells the engrossing story of  two women writers who become friends at Lovegood College, an elite Southern women’s college.   The book begins at a slight distance from the two main characters–crucial for the introduction of two heroines who experiment with different forms of literary fiction and New Journalism. The dean  and the dorm mistress  converse about the problem of a suitable roommate for Feron Hood, a student accepted at the last minute. Her uncle, a lawyer, is the grandson of one of the first Lovegood alumnae, and he says Feron needs a safe environment:  she has run away from an abusive stepfather, lived on the streets of Chicago, and then taken a bus to  North Carolina, where she showed up in his office unannounced.

Who would feel at home with Feron? Finally they decide that charming Meredith Grace Jellicoe, a rich tobacco farmer’s daughter, would be a good match.  And this pairing is in a way like writing a story: the dean and dorm mistress set them on a lifelong course of friendship and storytelling.

Class matters:  you can’t pair a girl from a working-class family shaped by a mother’s alcoholism and stepfather’s violence with a privileged young woman like Merry Grace unless you expect complications. On the surface, everything is fine. Feron likes Merry Grace, but is envious of her background.  Merry Grace is not only from a happy family but is lovely with her honey-gold hair and unselfconsiousness.  Feron thinks enviously: “Everything was contained in her. As though God, when making her, took great pains to color all of her inside the lines.”
Their mutual love of Chekhov, and Godwin’s own analysis of his graceful style, help us understand the shaping of the Feron’s and Merry Grace’s writing careers. For a creative writing assignment in English class, Merry Grace uses Chekhov’s “Typhus,” the story of a young Russian soldier who becomes ill and infects his sister, as the template of a story she writes about a girl who comes down with influenza in 1918. After reading this, Feron hones her own autographical short story about a middle-aged woman who pours out her problems to a girl on the bus. But Feron doesn’t begin to write seriously until years later in New York when she sees a short story by Merry Grace in The Atlantic Monthly.

Godwin’s characterization of their contrasting personalities gives us insight into the anger and haughtiness of Feron, who  prefers house-sitting in New York City to renting an apartment, and writes novels that are retellings of very dark fairy tales.  Sometimes I thought, “Feron, do you have to be so weird?”   Merry Grace, who is the much better friend,  turned out to be the unlucky one in a way: her parents died in the middle of her freshman year, and Merry Grace had to leave school and take over the tobacco business.  Merry Grace is truly supportive of reserved Feron, who is seldom, if ever, there for her, but even Merry Grace is exasperated at one point.  But their correspondence helps them work out their approaches to writing. And Merry Grace’s involvement with a black church while she is researching a freed slave’s invention of a tobacco process is life-changing.  Though Godwin never comes out and says this, it is the African-American women in this Bible study group who are Merry Grace’s true friends. 

In case you’re wondering, "Old Lovegood Girls" is nothing like Mary McCarthy’s The Group–but brilliant in a different way. Godwin is fascinated by the process of writing, and shows us how it’s done.

This was a really thoughtful and intriguing book. Would recommend to historical fiction fans who enjoy a book with strong relationships between characters.

Thank you to NetGalley, Gail Godwin, and Bloomsbury Publishing for allowing me to read this ARC for my honest review.

Having a couple of friends, whom I don’t see often; but, when I do, we pick up talking right where we left off, reminds me of this charming book about friendship. Feron Hood, lives with her older uncle and his longtime fiancé, after leaving an unstable home of abuse and neglect. Merry Jellicoe lives in a positive home, filled with love and companionship. How could these two opposites possibly live together in peace at Lovegood Junior College? The dean has paired them up as roommates and they instantly like each other. Both girls love to write, compete, and encourage each other to do well. When Merry suddenly leaves school to take over her family’s tobacco farm, the girls lose touch, but get together throughout the years and feel like they have never been apart. This is a wonderful story about how we change and grow as we age and keep our true friends close to our hearts.

Tobacco heiress Merry Jellico and mystery girl Ferron Hood are roommates during their first semester at Lovegood. Merry has led a typical sheltered life–the worst thing that has happened in her life is her dog died. Ferron has a mysterious past, but one that includes ties to the college. She is inducted into the sorority of Lovegood legacies. The pivotal moment in the early part of the story is Ferron reading Merry’s short story. Merry is a natural writer. Ferron is an excellent writer, too, but had not considered it as a career until that moment. Sadly, at the start of Christmas break their worlds change forever.

To me, that was the end of the novel. The rest of the story was an annoying back-and-forth through decades then memories, then a new decade. I suppose the term another reviewer used, “stream of consciousness” is the correct term for the structure of the second half of the novel.

I found the memory of that first semester’s friendship to be silly. One semester? I don’t even remember my first-semester roommate’s last name. Was Ferron jealous of Merry? Did Merry just know she was better but use the excuse of that (no spoilers) incident keep from following up her one real success? To be honest, I didn’t care enough to figure it out.

This book would have been much better if Godwin had dwelt on the faculty and workings of the college–with Ferron and Merry just a part of that. If she had skipped the rambling and the rapid changes in decade, too, reading it would have been easier. The characters of several of the instructors/professors were far more interesting that mystery girl Ferron or old money Merry.
My Verdict
3.0

I’ve given it a higher rating because I do not like stream of consciousness novels much and it probably will delight people who enjoy them.

Time slips by, but friendship endure in Gail Godwin’s novel. “Old Lovegood Girls.” The historical fiction is the latest from the award-winning novelist. Within its pages, two young women share a complex friendship that survives decades.
It’s 1958 at the idyllic campus, and Feron Hood has arrived with little luggage and a lot of mystery at Lovegood Junior College for Girls, an private two-year college heaped in tradition. Dean Susan Fox and dorm mistress Winifred Darden aren’t sure what to make of the newcomer, or who to place her with as a roommate. They decide to pair Feron with Merry Jellicoe, a student known for her positive nature and easy smile.
The two girls seem to be opposites of darkness and light. From that odd start springs an enduring friendship that carries Ferron and Merry through school, celebrations and a tragedy that cuts their school year short.
The women go their separate ways, living their own lives, but never far from each other’s memories. Merry writes letters, Feron thinks about answering them. Merry lives in the moment, while Feron lives within her own deep thoughts.
There are good times and bad, success and failure, love and loss, but all are beautifully detailed. Through Godwin’s carefully crafted descriptions, the two women and their supporting cast of characters seem more real than fictional.
It’s easy to picture Feron as she passes through life with an older uncle Rowan and his longtime fiancé Blanche, a father she believes molested her and a mother known as a liar. She writes several novels, yet self-satisfaction remains elusive while she chases life in New York City
Merry’s life, while it appears charmed on the outside, carries the sadness of losing her beloved brother Ritchie, a mother who locked herself in a room for months each year, and a love that she never expected. When Merry is forced to take over the family’s tobacco business, she finds that she’s stronger than she thought in a life she never would have imagined.
As the friends age, they go years without seeing each other. Each has married, and each has carved out a career as a writer. Yet, when they finally come together, it’s like time picked up from when they laid in the Lovegood grass and swapped wishes for the future.
There is much they have to say to each other, some of which has been kept as deeply-held secrets that finally come to light in bit and pieces during their 40 years of knowing each other. Through it all, Feron and Merry never lose the bond of friendship that has defined them for decades.
Through their story, Godwin presents a narrative of what two friends tell each other and what they leave unsaid. The depth of her character’s introspection may be a result of Godwin’s own 80 years-plus of well-lived life. Her storytelling is powerful, emotional and long lasting well beyond the novel’s Last page.

Feron and Merry, two young women with little in common apart from a love of writing, form a lifelong, yet disjointed connection. They first meet as roommates assigned to share a dorm room during their freshman year at Lovegood Junior College..A tragic accident Christmas night changes everything.
The school’s dean and several professors prominently figure in the course of their lives. The school is the tie that binds them.
Sporadic communication, seemingly acceptable to both, somehow sustains their friendship..They meet together only a few times over the years. Merry reaches out, and Feron holds back. Each admires the other’s attributes they find missing in themself. Yet, the bond they share seems to deepen with life’s passing they more intimately unveil their real selves.

Thank you Netgalley for a copy of this title in exchange for an honest review. I personally could not get into this book. I found myself just not caring about either of the main characters and found I would flip forward to hopefully finding something of interest. Unfortunately, it did not appear to me. I was debating giving any feedback on this title, as I finished only 50%, but could not complete. This one just fell flat for me.

I'm not sure what I want to say about this book. Did I like it? Yes. Did it ring true to me? Yes. Friendships can stand through time, although the length of time that Feron goes, without contacting Merry, seems extreme. But then, Feron's good life didn't really start until she went to her Uncle's and he sent her to get a proper education. And Merry's happy life took a bit of a turn during college when the girls both met. Both girls were writers. They told their stories in different ways. I liked both girls for different reasons. And I think readers will enjoy this story.

I’ve loved Gail Godwin’s books for years. “Father Melancholy’s Daughter” was my intro to her, and since reading that book, I always browsed in the “G”‘s at the library back in the ’90s, looking to see if she’d written anything new. She’s now 82, and is still writing: “Old Lovegood Girls” is her latest.

The book takes its title from Lovegood, the junior college where Feron and Merry meet as roommates in 1958. At Lovegood, young ladies are “removed from strife … they may seek the mental life.” I really enjoyed the first part of the book detailing the girls’ time at Lovegood. Due to a tragic event, after one semester their time together there is over and they head their separate ways. The rest of the book hops to various times in the future, as Merry and Feron live their own lives and keep in touch — or rather, think about keeping in touch.

Merry is the classic good girl: “Was a person like Merry born with her character, or had it been built up brick-by-brick by people who taught her to choose the good, the kind, and the true? … God had taken pains to color all of her inside the lines.” She is good about sending letters to Feron — who is not so good about responding.

Feron lives a lot inside her own head. She’s a writer and editor, and even as she feels bad about not responding to Merry’s communications, she ponders “How could you feel so bound up with the idea of what someone meant to you, yet feel no urge to get in touch with the real person?” She lets a decade or so pass before getting in touch with her former roommate.

So, we get to check in on the friends every decade or so, and we get a lot of writing about them thinking about each other. We get a lot of thoughts about the books they are writing (particularly Feron). The book becomes pretty stream-of-consciousness in the second half and just didn’t really hold my attention much at that point, sadly.

I’m realizing that Godwin’s latest books just haven’t been the wins for me that her earlier ones were. I loved “Flora” (2013), but felt “Grief Cottage” (2017) was a little flat. “Old Lovegood Girls (2020) joins the “flat” club, although I love the “feel” of Godwin’s books still. I’m pretty sure she’s an introverted, cerebral person, who I could relate to a lot in real life.

Gave this one three tries and gave up. Not my cup of tea. It may be the right book for some readers, but not for this one.

Dreadful...simply dreadful. The characters were incredibly uninteresting and the storyline trite. I couldn't get past the first few chapters.

I have read all of Gail Godwin's books and thoroughly enjoyed. This one not so much.. Story revolves around the lives of two women who meet in college, both are writers, one more famous than the other. The latter writes stories based on her life?, I had a really hard time following this story line. I like the descriptions of the places that both lived and how their lives developed. That said, I don't think that I would recommend..

I had high hopes going into this one but I wasn't in love with this title. I did enjoy it.. it just didn't impress me as much as I had hoped. This is a tale about friendship and deceit. I always like a story that has a little bit of darkness in it.. and this book certainly had notes of macabre. The plot was also fresh and interesting. This was in the historical fiction genre. Other historical fiction fans may really like this title. I would rate this book a solid three out of five stars. I would also recommend it to customers interested in a unique historical fiction novel. One thing I can definitely say about this book.. I've never read anything like it!

The story of a lifelong friendship between two women who first meet at Lovegood College in 1958. Feron comes from a terrible, dark, background and has trouble connecting with people in any meaningful way; complacent and composed, Merry comes from a happy background and yet suffers a tragedy that forces her to withdraw from school after only one semester. Both develop literary interests and talents which feature in the story.

It’s an odd (to me) friendship and an odder narrative. After bonding immediately as freshman roommates, their next contact isn’t for ten years and remains sporadic after that. The narrative plays off this strange relationship by leaping from contact to contact and filling in the (event rich) intervening years via memories and asides. Thus whole marriages are relegated to a sad memory summarized in a couple of lines.

In some ways the book is written well — the language is good, the characters interesting, the dialog decent. However, it was difficult to get invested in the characters and this central relationship when there was so little to it. The author does convey the closeness each feels to the other, in spite of the fact that neither seems to make much effort to connect more often. It’s possible that these are just not people or modes of interaction that would work for me — I didn’t particularly like either of the main characters. I could not manage to find empathy for Feron, despite knowing her background and being privy to her inner thoughts. Merry was less well developed and while likable, she was far too passive for my taste. I feel like a real friendship would have brought out more in the other — the fact that these two felt close, despite rarely seeing or talking to each other, wasn’t much of a story.

While there was a lot in the book I liked — the (very different) literary aspirations, motivations, and processes for the two; the full depictions of Merry’s tobacco farm, Feron’s New York City life, Lovegood college, and the other characters — overall I found it rather depressing. Nobody in the book has a particularly happy life, and while the tone is not overly dramatic (the action is removed since it’s all in history), I felt dragged into an emotional pall. While each character seemed to have found some happiness or sense of accomplishment in their life, we don’t get to experience that directly. Overall I found the book mildly interesting from an intellectual perspective and mildly depressing from the emotional.

Gail Gordon's Old Lovegood Girls is not a "happy" book, but it is a compelling one. Two young girls from very different backgrounds meet at boarding school and their bond of a lifelong friendship begins.

This novel chronicles the extraordinary friendship/love between two women. It started when they were roommates in a small, Southern Junior College, Lovegood. Merry comes from a well to do, intact Southern family, but Ferron comes from a world of rejection and shameful secrets. Yet these two different girls form a bond that lasts through their lifetimes, despite the years between their visits.

My problem with the novel is that it is relentlessly negative. Does nothing good ever happen? I found this very hard to absorb, despite the beautiful writing. It was not a satisfying book for me, but I could not put it down. It is rare that I find a book so hard to describe, but this novel has me stumped.

So, I enjoyed reading about the friendship, the love, the bond between talented and special women, but I regret having to read about their difficult lives, strewn with boulders.

Thank you Netgalley for the opportunity to read this novel.