A moving, emotional, and unpredictable drama.
In Meade’s debut novel, a young man struggles to keep his relationship with his girlfriend afloat while uncovering his own family’s secrets.
When 23-year-old David first meets Hope, he’s immediately taken by her easy charm and beauty, thinking she’s an “effervescent fairy” and a “harbinger of light and good will.” However, he increasingly finds her inscrutable and sees cracks in the persona that she presents, which creates emotional distance between them. She was clearly badly burned in a fire, but he doubts her account of how it happened. One night, during a sexual encounter, he refuses to grant her unsettling request that he strike her in the face. Meade, through David’s perspective, poignantly captures the awkward, unspoken discomfort between them immediately afterward: “I didn’t understand then what you needed to be able to feel. That you needed me to cut through the layers you covered yourself with. I just didn’t know how to do it.” Still, David perseveres, intent on not becoming “just another person on the list of people who have let her down.” He inherits a “rotting cabin” in the woods of New Hampshire from his recently deceased paternal grandfather, Theo, who lived a secluded life as a hermit and always remained something of a mystery. As David continues to recount his faltering relationship with his girlfriend and tries to decipher a series of clues in the cabin that point to well-guarded family secrets, he becomes increasingly aware of a presence in the woods. The entire story is conveyed from David’s first-person perspective, framed as a communication to Hope. Over the course of the novel, Meade artfully explores the cumbersome weight of personal secrets and the emotional consequences of concealing a source of profound shame. It’s revealed, for instance, that David has his own cross to bear—he hit an elderly man with his car and fled the scene of the accident—and Meade vividly depicts the manner in which he tries to free himself of his guilt.
A moving, emotional, and unpredictable drama.Pub Date: April 14, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-63152-691-6
Page Count: 272
Publisher: She Writes Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 30, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Hannah, after eight paperbacks, abandons her successful time-travelers for a hardcover life of kitchen-sink romance. Everyone must have got the Olympic Peninsula memo for this spring because, as of this reading, authors Hannah, Nora Roberts, and JoAnn Ross have all placed their newest romances in or near the Quinault rain forest. Here, 40ish Annie Colwater, returns to Washington State after her husband, high-powered Los Angeles lawyer Blake, tells her he’s found another (younger) woman and wants a divorce. Although a Stanford graduate, Annie has known only a life of perfect wifedom: matching Blake’s ties to his suits and cooking meals from Gourmet magazine. What is she to do with her shattered life? Well, she returns to dad’s house in the small town of Mystic, cuts off all her hair (for a different look), and goes to work as a nanny for lawman Nick Delacroix, whose wife has committed suicide, whose young daughter Izzy refuses to speak, and who himself has descended into despair and alcoholism. Annie spruces up Nick’s home on Mystic Lake and sends “Izzy-bear” back into speech mode. And, after Nick begins attending AA meetings, she and he become lovers. Still, when Annie learns that she’s pregnant not with Nick’s but with Blake’s child, she heads back to her empty life in the Malibu Colony. The baby arrives prematurely, and mean-spirited Blake doesn’t even stick around to support his wife. At this point, it’s perfectly clear to Annie—and the reader—that she’s justified in taking her newborn daughter and driving back north. Hannah’s characters indulge in so many stages of the weeps, from glassy eyes to flat-out sobs, that tear ducts are almost bound to stay dry. (First printing of 100,000; first serial to Good Housekeeping; Literary Guild/Doubleday book club selections)
Pub Date: March 31, 1999
ISBN: 0-609-60249-7
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1999
The heartfelt soap appears to be Hannah’s chosen romance niche, and she mines it skillfully. (First printing of 125,000)
Hannah’s sequel to On Mystic Lake (1999) is yet another tear-jerker set in northwest Washington State.
Perfect mother Mikaela (“Mike”) Campbell takes a hard fall off a horse, hits her head, and sinks into a coma. In order to help bring her out of it, perfect husband-doctor Liam sits at her bedside and begins to talk to her about their life together. He brings her favorite music, scented potpourri, and, to place across her inert body, sweaters that may smell like home. He also tries to keep life as normal as possible for their two kids: Bret, nine years old, and Jacey, Mike’s teenaged daughter by her previous husband. Going through Mike’s closet to find a prom dress for Jacey, Liam stumbles on souvenirs of her first marriage and a picture of her ex—not just any old, anonymous first husband, but Julian True, a gorgeous superstar actor, the hero of women’s fantasies all over America. Liam has always known that he got Mikaela on the rebound; she was honest about the fact that he was not the love of her life. But she is the love of his life, and when she doesn't respond to the sound of his voice, he contacts Julian in hopes that the actor can save Mikaela. Julian travels up to Last Bend, a cutesy town founded by Liam’s larger-than-life father and filled with homey shops like the Emperor’s New Clothes store and Zeke’s Feed and Seed. When Mike finally comes out of unconsciousness and into her family’s emotional upheaval, she apologizes to Liam and bids goodbye to Julian. Yes, she’s discovered that it’s that gentle guy who stays with you through years of cramps and decorating the Christmas tree who defines what love really is.
The heartfelt soap appears to be Hannah’s chosen romance niche, and she mines it skillfully. (First printing of 125,000)Pub Date: April 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-609-60592-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2007
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