A highly readable historical tale with a memorable heroine in the mold of Gone with the Wind’s Scarlett O’Hara.
In Flynn’s debut novel, a young girl reluctantly moves from the Midwest to San Francisco in 1904, only to fall in love with the vibrant young city and the possibilities it offers for amusement and success.
When Lily Anne O'Brien and her parents arrive in San Francisco, the headstrong girl, who’s “almost twelve,” isn’t happy to leave Chicago. Even before she arrives at her aunt and uncle’s home on Mission Street, however, she’s changed her mind completely: “San Francisco is a living, breathing opera to me!” she declares. “I want to live here forever!” Her determination to become a part of the growing city becomes the motivating factor of the rest of her life. In order to live with her aunt, uncle, and cousin, rather than follow her parents to a San Jose, California, farm, she agrees to train her lovely singing voice for actual opera, even though the training bores her. Charming and willful, she prefers sneaking out to supper clubs with Kevin Riley, a 27-year-old gambler who falls for her at first sight. When her parents attempt to intervene in the relationship, she impulsively marries him, although she’s really only in love with all the things he can give her. Flynn depicts Lily Anne as beautiful, talented, charismatic, and deeply selfish—a woman who consistently makes life choices—as a wife, a mother, an entertainer, and an entrepreneur—based on her own self-interest and her resolve never to leave the city she loves. Her story and those of her family members and friends evolve against the backdrop of San Francisco history, including the frightening destruction of the 1906 earthquake and subsequent rebuilding, the Prohibition era, and the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge. The story ties up some of its romantic loose ends a bit too neatly, and there are a number of racist comments by characters that go unchallenged in the narrative. However, Flynn’s style is engaging and accessible, and the story of the irrepressible Lily Anne (and later, her sensible daughter, Charlotte) will pull readers along to the very end.
A highly readable historical tale with a memorable heroine in the mold of Gone with the Wind’s Scarlett O’Hara.Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5237-2505-2
Page Count: 394
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A smooth blend of suspense and romance. As ever, the author's trademark effortless style keeps a complex plot moving without...
Megaselling Roberts (River's End, 1999, etc.) goes to Napa Valley for the tale of an Italian-American family wine producers rocked by scandal and a series of murders.
Dynasty head Tereza Giambelli knows that her granddaughter Sophia is the only family member capable of running a multimillion-dollar wine business—and no one contradicts La Signora. It's just as well the lovely young woman is still single: Tereza has plans for her. The matriarch has recently married Eli MacMillan, the American founder of another famous wine company. Eli's grandson Tyler knows everything there is to know about producing wine, from the vineyard to the vat. Ruggedly handsome, intelligent and earthy, he's a perfect match for public-relations whiz Sophia—or so thinks Tereza. The two young people begin to work together; Tyler teaches Sophia the fine art of making wine and making love. But other family members hope to claim their share of the Giambelli fortune, and people start dying mysteriously, including Sophia's good-for-nothing father, Tony Avano. Long divorced from long-suffering Pilar Giambelli, Tony led an opulent, self-indulgent life that provides plenty of murder suspects. He might have been killed by the mob, or a jealous mistress, or his spoiled brother-in-law, Tereza's lazy son, who's produced a passel of brats with his foolish Italian wife in the hopes of making Tereza happy. Everyone has a motive, and nothing is what it seems, Sophia discovers, but Tyler stands by her. Then a bottle of tainted merlot kills a company exec. A tragic mishap caused by poisonous plants growing near the vines? Or deliberate product tampering intended to destroy the company? Sophia and Tyler will need to delve even deeper into the convoluted and sometimes unsavory history of the family and its three-generation business.
A smooth blend of suspense and romance. As ever, the author's trademark effortless style keeps a complex plot moving without a hitch.Pub Date: March 19, 2001
ISBN: 0-399-14712-8
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2001
Entertaining and unpredictable; Reid makes a compelling argument for happiness in every life.
Reid’s latest (After I Do, 2014, etc.) explores two parallel universes in which a young woman hopes to find her soul mate and change her life for the better.
After ending an affair with a married man, Hannah Martin is reunited with her high school sweetheart, Ethan, at a bar in Los Angeles. Should she go home with her friends and catch up with him later, or should they stay out and have another drink? It doesn’t seem like either decision would have earth-shattering consequences, but Reid has a knack for finding skeletons in unexpected closets. Two vastly different scenarios play out in alternating chapters: in one, Hannah and Ethan reconnect as if no time has passed; in the other, Hannah lands in the hospital alone after a freak accident that marks the first of many surprising plot twists. Hannah’s best friend, Gabby, believes in soul mates, and though Hannah has trouble making decisions—even when picking a snack from a vending machine—she and Gabby discover how their belief systems can alter their world as much as their choices. “Believing in fate is like living on cruise control,” Hannah says. What follows is a thoughtful analysis of free will versus fate in which Hannah finds that disasters can bring unexpected blessings, blessings can bring unexpected disasters, and that most people are willing to bring Hannah her favorite cinnamon rolls. “Because even when it looks like she’s made a terrible mistake,” Hannah’s mother observes, “things will always work out for Hannah.” The larger question becomes whether Hannah’s choices will ultimately affect her happiness—and it’s one that’s answered on a hopeful note as Hannah tries to do the right thing in every situation she faces.
Entertaining and unpredictable; Reid makes a compelling argument for happiness in every life.Pub Date: July 7, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4767-7688-0
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Washington Square/Pocket
Review Posted Online: April 14, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2015
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