Three Junes by Julia Glass

Every day, if we're lucky, we make connections with other people. A smile, a gesture, a story gets passed from one of us to another. Round and round it goes, this whirl of human interaction. Rarely do we see the whole of it--how one person's kindness persuades another to be kind, or how an anecdote passed on and on acquires polish. Julia Glass' Three Junes gives readers this vision: we sees how the passage of time links people together in small but consequential ways. Divided into three sections, the novel follows the McLeod family and friends in disparate parts of the world: the 1st June focuses on father Paul McLeod in Greece; the 2nd June, his son Fenno in New York; and the 3rd June, their friend Fern, also in NYC. The book's Junes span just about a decade, but that is plenty of time for the reader to see the important role serendipity and chance meetings play in life. Three Junes is remarkable for its hopefulness--there is a pattern and plan in life, and coincidences are not meaningless. When life seems chaotic, it's important to remember this message.