Life-altering conflicts handled in simplistic, unrealistic yet heartwarming ways; more of the same for Cedar Key fans, who...
When a recent widow learns a shocking secret about her husband, she books a trip to Paris, hoping the time and distance will give her an opportunity to sort out her options, never expecting that the trip will give her a new chance at forgiveness and love.
After the death of her husband, Marin moves back to the Florida island of Cedar Key, going into business with her mother, Dora, who owns the local yarn shop. Together, they have decided to take over the shop next door and expand into more needle crafts. As work begins on the new space, their contractor falls ill, and Dora and Marin learn that a wealthy neighbor does the occasional renovation project and that he is happy to help them out. Working together brings Marin and Worth close, and friendship and an attraction grow, one Marin will come to rely on as she learns that her husband had been unfaithful and left behind a 19-year-old daughter, Fiona. Marin decides to take a vacation to Paris to contemplate her options and decide how she might move forward and tell her grown sons about this new development. When she mentions that she’s having a hard time finding a hotel, Worth offers to let her use the apartment he owns in Paris and then decides to join her for part of her trip. Romance blooms, and when they return to Cedar Key, Marin feels prepared to deal with putting her bitterness behind her, while navigating how to integrate her husband’s child into the family. DuLong’s fifth installment of the Cedar Key series, low-key, small-town romances designed around a knitting theme, proceeds as expected. Not much new ground here, and the plot marches along with steadfast good cheer and serendipity. Everything turns out better than anyone could have expected, and the characters feel blessed and grateful for that fact.
Life-altering conflicts handled in simplistic, unrealistic yet heartwarming ways; more of the same for Cedar Key fans, who will love it.Pub Date: Nov. 26, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-7582-8813-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Kensington
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
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
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.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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