Write My Name Across the Sky: A Novel

Her prose is wonderful - smooth as silk. Her characters have depth and dimension - thoughtful, funny, irritating, kind, flawed, intriguing and interesting. She has a way of weaving a story which pulls my emotions in many directions. Well with the read!

This is a wonderful family drama. It’s about 3 creative women, bound by love and family. Meet half sisters, Sam and Willow, and their aunt, Gloria, a mother figure after their own mother died. Each woman has her own sphere of creativity, and I love how the author shows us each one. As the story opens, the two sisters are each facing a creative crisis, and needs the other two (as well as friends and colleagues) to help her resolve it. Each woman also has (or had) a man in her creative corner, so to speak. Gloria lost touch with the man she loved deeply decades ago, but thinks about him often as her crisis circles around her. Sam’s best friend cut her off a year ago, and she feels adrift without his support. Willow hasn’t ever had a supportive relationship, and washes up back in New York after the last disappointing relationship with a man ends. I really like how the author deals with the man-woman love-partnership puzzles of each woman. No fairy tales, but very human, very real tales of the hard personal growth and deep need for forgiveness we all experience in our most treasured relationships. If you like stories about mature women who face personal challenges with courage and who help each other, you’ll like this one. If you like stories about creativity and the often lonely path of the creatively driven, you’ll like it. If you like stories about the possibilities of creative partnerships between men and women, you’ll like it. It’s a clean read, with no swearing or violence, and a couple of discreet off-screen sex scenes.

Melancholy through out, this story has a wonderful ending. The writing is excellent and the story believable. 50 years ago, like Gloria, I also had an unforgettable love affair but I didn't move art treasures around the world. The descriptions of her lover and their coming together and their coming apart touched me deeply. Esme and Eloise, the begonias, and Gloria's feelings for their contribution to her life made the story full of feeling when she had to leave. Willow and her talent was amazing and the description of the music she made with Josiah, blissful. Sam was a bad brat who I couldn't really like until the end of the story. Yes, write my name across the sky, please do!

Sadness from the lose of someone dear to you is fractious. It tears you apart especially if it’s a parent. Two sisters different in looks, in fathers, in personalities in life sharing the same sadness for a mother that is gone. Sam the oldest berates her younger sister Willow for no apparent reason. Maybe she’s just mean. A serious illness brings Sam to the edge of life and many decisions she questions now. Her aunt Gloria has her secrets but she is steadfastly there for the girls. So many interesting characters along with their interesting lives makes this a great book to read. Their personality complications and love problems makes for a story worthy of your time. Hope you like it as well as I did.

I love this author's way of spinning a story. If needed something to just 'take me away' and this book did just that. I love the gentle girl power focus. Guys came second. How refreshing. I also love that it was set in NY, always a treat. My sister is a concert violinist. I'm classically trained but chose songwriting because I love lyrics. Both of us were prodigies as kids. The only part of the book that didn't quite ring true was the, "I'm going to compose a folky piece and win a competition that pays my rent," bit. Ugh... not quite how it goes. I've won many a classical competition. They are strictly written note. And then there are songwriting competitions - mostly a way for certain people to make a lot of money off innocent amatuer songwriters. But this mix of Celtic/violin/lyrics turning into a competition piece? Nope. That's like watching people fake playing instruments during films. Giant eye roll. But this book was so lovely - and even the music part, SO sweet, I vote 'no biggie' and give it five stars. I do believe escaping into music is a way many musicians go. I do believe the edgy sister, the free-spirited aunt who flies around. And I was married to an Israeli lol. They can be quite charming. This one sounded very special :-) Sweet book, awesome writer. A person just forgets they are reading and sinks into the book...!

Enjoyable book to read and/or listen to, the performance was very good. Took me a while to get into the book, but it was interesting and different. I recommend this book,

I have been a fan of Barbara O'Neal's books for years. The combination of her compelling characters and settings leave me wishing to spend more time in the worlds she creates. This story focuses on two generations of women who are fiercely independent almost to a fault. Samantha (Sam) is a brilliant computer game developer and Willow, a gifted musician, are sisters. Gloria (aka "Aunt G") a 70ish instagrammer, and guardian of the girls, was a jet setting flight attendant with a past filled with lost love and questionable choices that finally catch up with her. Prepare to be drawn in by these beautifully flawed characters and their journeys of secrets and aspirations. Now, years after the overdose of Sam and Willow's famous mother, also Gloria's sister, they are all still searching in their own ways. Barbara's talent for appealing to your five senses entices you to curl up and completely escape into the lives of these women and their complicated relationships. Her understanding of sisters is seamlessly woven into the intriguing world of music, art and forgery. Barbara O'Neal's ability to make you miss her characters well after you finish reading makes me impatient for the book to be published so I can revisit them...always the sign of a great read!

The story is about Gloria, a retired TWA flight attendant, and her two nieces, Sam and Willow. The story bounces between each of their points of view but it's clear whose story is being told. The writing is beautiful as O'Neal's writing always is, but to me it was overblown with too many extraneous details. She is fascinated by the relationships and bonds between women, but sometimes overdoes it. The stories get repetitive and it takes too long to get to the gist of what happened. The core story is about the three women and the men they have loved or might love. Sam is unlikeable, and her software company is going under. Willow, a musician, is running from a failed relationship in LA. The two girls couldn’t be more different. The three women are united in the fabulous NY apartment inherited from the girls’ mother, Gloria’s sister, the singer of the title song, who died young of a drug overdose. The apartment sounds wonderful but do we have to hear about the light streaming in and what they see out the windows so often? There is little mention of day to day practicalities like who pays for what, or anyone’s income. The men are almost side notes to the women’s stories. Gloria’s story is the most interesting, but takes forever to unfold. Sam is unlikeable and pushes everyone away. Her illness is drawn out way too long. Willow’s love of music is also mentioned too often. Her romance seems like an afterthought. I think O’Neal gets so caught up in the characters and descriptions that she loses sight of the threads of the plot. All three stories are wrapped up quickly.

Brilliantly written, thoroughly enjoyed this book. I can't wait to read more of her work. A new fave for me

When a well known rock star named Billie Rose died from a drug overdose, her sister Gloria took in Billie's two daughters, Willow aged about nine and Sam thirteen years old. They moved into Billie's enormous New York City apartment, complete with a roof top greenhouse. Gloria gave up her job as a flight attendant and her often lover, Isaak. Nearly thirty years later, Gloria learns that Isaak has been arrested for art forgery and theft in Florence, Italy. Now Gloria has to make a decision in order to save herself as she knows she abetted those crimes. Willow has followed in her mother's footsteps and is an accomplished musician while Sam has developed a software company making computer games with much success. These three women will all have to make life decisions to choose what their futures will be. I very much enjoyed this book which is well written and the storyline which is different and intriguing. When you think about the characters for days after finishing the book and wonder how they are doing, you know you have a winner.

I am so glad that I chanced upon this book. So deep. So rich. So intense. So vivid. So well written

Die Personen leben. Die Situationen sind zwar nicht alltäglich aber die lesende Person wird in eine neue faszinierende Welt katapultiert, in der sie lebt, leidet und schwelgt, so lange sie im Buch liest

I wasn't too sure about this book at first, I struggled to get into it. But once I got past them, the book opened up to me. This was very unusual , as I have never had this happen with any other of her books 📚. Once I got past those chapters, boy, did it all change. I absolutely loved loved it. It made me lol, and she'd some tears. Oh, how I love Barbara's work, I'm just heading off to dive into another of Barbara's books 📚. I would definitely recommend that you read this book. You won't be disappointed.