Far from Innocence, By: Lois Wyse – a Book Review

Spanning from 1926 to 1961, this is the story of Sophie Namath and Mac Sloan, both from poor families of Hungarian descent, who meet on a trolly car and fall in love. They immediately discover they share a love of poetry and the ambition of achieving the “American Dream” – a family, a home, and their own successful business. It’s a classical ‘love at first sight’! Sophie starts out by making poppyseed strudel in her kitchen and Mac is good at selling, and over time they raise a family and despite the depression and World War II, they build an empire of restaurants and hotels.

Typical of novels focused on entertaining women in the 1970’s and 1980’s – Sophie is portrayed as a strong successful business woman – Type A personality. And typical of parents who are overachievers, they have a myriad of problems with their daughter and two sons.

Lois Wyse worked as a journalist for the local Cleveland newspapers and later for Vogue and Cosmopolitan. And she was a successful business woman herself – an executive of an Advertising Agency she and her husband founded, so many of the details of the plot seem authentic.

It’s an entertaining story with lots of action, good dialogue, and interesting characters. In fact, it’s a great story up until the last 10 pages when Lois Wyse seems to have tired of the plot and forced it to a hasty, contrived conclusion. What a shame because up to that moment, the book is a real page-turner.

Rated 2.5 Stars.
I use a rating scale of 1 to 5. Books rated 1, I seldom finish. Books rated 2, I usually finish but would never recommend to anyone. 5 is the highest rating.