POSTCARDS FROM CEDAR KEY

Name: POSTCARDS FROM CEDAR KEY
Author: Terri DuLong
ISBN: 978-0-7582-6866-2

by Terri DuLong ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 30, 2012

Lackluster writing and storytelling, as well as inconsistent plot elements, diminish the book’s impact, but many romance and...

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After her mother dies, Berkley Whitmore moves to Cedar Key, Fla., to open a chocolate shop, hoping to find the answers to a family mystery she’s uncovered; along the way, she’ll find the home she’s always dreamed of, with a new community of friends and the possibility of true love.

Berkley’s lived her 40-something years in New England, working with her mother and grandmother in the family chocolate business. After her mother dies, she finds a stack of postcards that lead her to the small island community of Cedar Key, where her mother apparently spent a number of months without Berkley, who was 5 at the time. Convinced the mystery has some significance and will help her overcome some of her ambivalence toward her mother, she begins to ask questions of the friendly, close-knit community. The move and the quest bring her closer to an aunt she’s never really known, the other business owners in Cedar Key and to a local author she feels she can fall in love with. She’s happier than she’s ever been, and her chocolates seem to be having a positive influence on the town too. Despite its intriguing premise, a cozy, small-town backdrop, and even the hint of some magic, this book fails to rise to its potential. The narrative tells rather than shows nearly every emotional element of the plot, and what could be an interesting unveiling of the mystery at the center of the story is so poorly handled that the answers are dumped together in an amateurish way, as well as blunted by the awkward and ham-fisted “climax” scene. The internal and external dialogue is often generic and unrealistic, and the characters are simplistic and two-dimensional. Even the core romance lacks tension, either emotional or sexual, and there doesn’t seem to be much in the way of conflict throughout most of the book, other than The Mystery, which the main character makes no real progress on until near the end of the book, when suddenly all the pieces fall into place, though, it’s not completely clear why some of those same pieces couldn’t have assembled themselves more than 100 pages earlier.

Lackluster writing and storytelling, as well as inconsistent plot elements, diminish the book’s impact, but many romance and DuLong fans will find this sweet story, set in a friendly community with some unique, texturizing details, enough to keep them interested.

Pub Date: Oct. 30, 2012

ISBN: 978-0-7582-6866-2

Page Count: 352

Publisher: Kensington

Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2012

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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SUMMER ISLAND

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2001

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...

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Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.

Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.

Pub Date: March 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-609-60737-5

Page Count: 336

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

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A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.