Adriana Trigiani has created a world well worth visiting and revisiting in her Big Stone Gap series. Milk Glass Moon, the last novel in the trilogy, brings Ave Marie Mulligan’s story full circle.
Her family and friends in the small Virginia mountain community are facing changes and challenges. Etta, her daughter, is growing up, preparing to leave the nest and making choices worrisome to her mother. Theodore, her best friend, has seized the opportunity to move to New York. Jack Mac, her husband, continues to reinvent himself in ways Ave Marie could have never imagined. The unforeseen causes Ave to question her relationship with her mother in order to save her relationship with her child.
As in the earlier Big Stone Gap novels, Ave Marie is torn between her love for Big Stone Gap and the Italian Alps. Trigiani brings first-time readers up to date with ease and reminds long time readers that Ave Marie met and married Jack Mac in the first novel, Big Stone Gap, and overcame marital problems in Big Cherry Holler. While it isn’t necessary to read all three novels to follow the story line of Milk Glass Moon, each book adds texture and detail to the ongoing story.
Adriana Trigiani, who wrote successfully for television and the theater before turning out her first novel, is a terrific storyteller. She has created endearing characters with complicated, realistic lives. It’s a pity to see the series end, but fans of the books should eventually be able to see them on the big screen. Trigiana has written and plans to direct the film version of Big Stone Gap. Pam Kingsbury writes from Florence, Alabama.
