Olivia (Rossner novel) Olivia (Rossner novel) Olivia (or, The Weight of the Past) is the penultimate novel by Judith Rossner, author of the critically acclaimed best sellers "Looking for Mr. Goodbar" and "August". Published in 1994 by Crown, "Olivia" examines "a mother-daughter conflict set in the world of gastronomy." Caroline Sindler is a chef and popular cooking teacher. In flashback, she recounts her past life: after showing an early interest, she learns to cook. After dropping out of college, she travels to Italy, where she finds work in a restaurant, and meets Angelo, a Sicilian in his thirties. After becoming pregnant by him,
Looking for Alaska the teenagers in this novel. The theme of hope plays a major role in "Looking for Alaska". Even though some of the novel's prominent themes are about death, grief and loss, John Green ties hope into the end of the novel to solve Pudge's internal conflict brought on by Alaska's death. In Barb Dean's chapter about the novel, she takes a closer look into Mr. Hyde's theology class where he discusses the similarity of the idea of hope between the founding figures of Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism. Mr. Hyde also asks the class what their call for hope is, and