SUMMER'S CHILD BY LUANNE RICE

SUMMER'S CHILD by Luanne Rice

Once again Luanne Rice has gifted us with an emotional tale set but this time she strays a bit from her familiar New England and gives us a Nova Scotia setting; she uses fictional towns and locations but my best guess is the Cape Breton area.

The very pregnant Mara Jameson had disappeared from the garden of her grandmother’s home in Connecticut on the summer solstice nine years earlier. Every year on the anniversary of her death, the media brings her name up again, wondering what in the world happened to the seemingly happy young woman. Recently retired police detective Patrick Murphy has never given up his quest. He has always thought her husband, successful businessman Edward Hunter had something to do with her disappearance but has never been able to prove anything. Every year he visits her grandmother, Maeve, hoping for another clue; something else she might remember.

in Hawk’s Cove, Nova,Scotia two women have come to escape abusive marriages. Both women have nine-year-old daughters. Lily Malone and her daughter, Rose, have lived in Hawk’s Cove for nine years. Lily runs a stitchery shop and her real love in her life is her daughter Rose wh was born with a heart defect and has been in an out of hospitals her entire life. The other woman is Marisa Taylor who with her daughter, Jessica,has more recently come to Hawk’s Cove. Marisa is more mysterious but the two young girls have become best friends. The two young women are a part of a larger group of women who call themselves the Nanouks, a group of\r\nfriends who are always there for one another in this isolated but idyllic are which draws many visitors who go on whale watching trips to see the many different types of whales including the amazing belugas.

Then there’s Liam Neill. Instead of captaining whale watching boats like the rest of the men in his family, he became an oceanographer, even after a terrible tragedy as a youth caused him the loss of an arm. He has become protective of Lily and Rose ever since they came to down and even though Rose cares for him a great deal, Lily and him have always remained at a distance emotionally. Then when tragedy is barely averted during what was supposed to be a fun whale watching outing for Rose’s 9t birthday, everything changes.

I started this book Saturday afternoon while looking out at the waters of the Strait of Juan de Fuca where I had just recently started the first whale watching trip I’d ever been on less than a month ago so of course was gripped to the pages from the beginning. I had the sound of the waves hitting the beach resonating all around me as I was reading, unable to put the book down. And a more emotional book I’d be hard pressed to find. I rarely have admitted this to others, so to do so in a review is really putting myself out there, but I have been in a relationship such as the one Lily and Marisa found themselves in. I could really identify with them.

And Liam. Ah Liam. Jamie Fraser from the Outlander series has often been called the most perfect hero in fiction written today. Liam Neill gives him a run for the money. He is sensitive, caring, and downright sexy. He is strong, intelligent, and loves children. What more could you ask for??

Luanne Rice’s emotional writing brought me to tears more than once, and she gave a twist near the end that I never saw coming – one that had me sit straight up from my halfway-lying down position! I was completely exhausted from a stay spent doing a very tedious chore, arriving home at 11PM, but I had about 90 more pages to read and even though I knew I had to get up early to go to work in the morning, there was no way I could not go to sleep without finishing this book. It is that good.

If I had any complaint about this book, it’s that I found it to not quite stand alone. It leads into Rice’s June 21st release SUMMER OF ROSES. But really, it is a minor quibble. You can be sure I will be first in line to get that book the day it comes out (do you think I can call the summer solstice a holiday so I can take the day off work to read it??) The book is so outstanding, the characters so wonderful, and the villain such a well-done villain. I’ve long been a fan of Luanne Rice’s books and this just cements her standing as one of the authors on my automatic-buy list. I think I actually may have a couple of her books around the house I haven’t read yet; that won’t be the case for much longer because I am going to round them all up and move them to the top of the TBR pile. Well done, Ms. Rice, I don’t know how I can stand waiting for the next two weeks! Note to family: Gift certificates make a good birthday presents (mine being in 11 days :-).

#10 - QUALITY OF CARE by Elizabeth Letts

by Elizabeth Letts
8.5/10
March 14th
March 16th
Mainstream Women’s Fiction 2005 263 pages
Clara Raymond, an OB-GYN physicianWalter, her business partnerGordon Robinson, her ex-boyfriend
Lydia Benson Robinson, her best friend from childhood
Eleanor Norton, owner of the California horse ranch
Jazmyn, stable hand at California horse ranch
Present day, New Jersey/California
Where did the book come from: Recent purchase
Reason for reading the book: Read review in Romantic Times magazine

I like these NAL Accent books. They’re trade paperback size and on the bottom it says “Fiction for the Way We Live” – Other authors in this line include a favorite of mine, Lisa Wingate; and several books I have in my TBR pile. I even like the feel of this book. The smooth pages, the size. I also like the conversation guide in the back which includes an interview with the author as well as a discussion guide. I do admit to sometimes reading the conversation guide before the book, allowing for spoilers sometimes, but it has never ruined my enjoyment of the book itself.

From the website for NAL books: Clara Raymond is the kind of obstetrician any woman would want—caring, skilled, dedicated. But she is caught off guard when a pregnant woman is wheeled onto the labor and delivery floor with what seem to be minor complaints. The patient turns out to be Lydia Benson, a childhood friend who saved Clara’s life after a terrible horseback-riding accident. And at Lydia’s side is her husband, Gordon Robinson, a man whom Clara once loved passionately and then left, although she has never forgotten him.

That night, in the labor and delivery rooms, the brief reunion goes tragically wrong. For Clara, the consequences will include a journey to California and to her own past— and a rediscovery of hope in a place she never expected…. An involving, nuanced story about the search for healing and the fragility of both our bodies and our souls, Quality of Care is an unforgettable debut by a talented and thought-provoking literary voice.

My comments: I am a sucker for a good medical story and this is a doozy. Letts, a midwife herself, writes about Dr. Clara Raymond an obstetrician who is on-call but busy with another patient when a childhood friend (Lydia) who is 34 weeks pregnant arrives in labor and delivery. Lydia happened to marry Clara's former live-in boyfriend, Gordon but Clara has lost touch with the two until they show up rather unexpectedly at the hospital. Lydia has vague symptoms but since Clara is busy with the other patient, goes unattended by other than the nursing staff for a brief period of time. Soon things go tragically wrong and eventually Clara ends up taking a trip to her childhood home in California to find answers regarding her own past. This book is really well done and is a great debut by an author to watch. The California portion of the book takes place on a horseranch and it says in the bio that the author is not only a midwife but a former competitive equestrian. I enjoyed nearly everything about this book and my only big complaint is that the book wasn’t longer. For those of you who are tired of the run-of-the-mill women’s fiction or coming-of-age stories, I would highly recommend QUALITY OF CARE for a great chance of pace. This is an exceptional read and I can’t wait to see what the author comes up with next. It can’t be too soon for me.

#9 VANISHING ACTS by Jodi Picoult

VANISHING ACTS

by Jodi Picoult

Date Began :

February 14, 2005

Date Finished February 27, 2005

Rating 8/10Date

Published: 2005

Genre: Fiction

Time/Place: Present day New Hampshire and Phoenix

Characters:

Delia Hopkins – Search and Rescue worker

Andrew Hopkins – Delia’s father, the head of a senior center

Sophie – Delia’s daughter

Eric – Delia’s attorney fiancé (and Sophie’s father)

Fitz – Good friend of Eric and Delia

Ruthann – The Hopi woman who befriends the group in Arizona

Elise – Delia’s mother

# of Pages: 448

Where did the book come from: eBay (I couldn’t wait!)

Reason for reading the book: Picoult is one of my favorite authors and one of the most consistent at telling a compelling story

BRIEF BLURB:
Told in alternating first-person point of view by the five main characters, Picoult tells a heart-rendering story of Delia Hopkins who has grown up believing her mother is dead, only to discover via triggered memories, that she is very alive and that her father kidnapped her 28 years previously, failing to return her to her mother after a weekend visitation. A search and rescue worker, Delia’s job—with the great assistance of her trusty bloodhound Greta--is to help find people who have gone missing. But when long-dormant memories surface and Delia finds out her whole life has been a lie, she is the one who, in reality, needs rescuing the most.

MY COMMENTS: (WARNING SOME MIGHT CALL THIS A SPOILER)
While not one of my favorite Picoult books, this was a solid read. I felt that it was about 100 pages too long in that many of the details of Andrew’s time in jail could have been omitted. I was glad though that Picoult didn’t end the book with a pat HEA ending but made it more real than some of the books I’ve read. I was also disappointed that there wasn’t a huge twist at the end that I didn’t see coming (which has become a hallmark of Picoult’s books). So, while the book was good, it wasn’t great, and I ended up giving it a 8.5/10 (B+).

#8 THE SEX LIFE OF CANNIBALS: Adrift in the Equatorial Pacific

#8 THE SEX LIFE OF CANNIBALS: Adrift in the Equatorial Pacific
by J. Maarten Troost
Date Began: February 12, 2004
Date Finished: February 14, 2004
Rating 10/10
Date Published 2004
Genre: Non-fiction/Travel Essays
Time/Place: 1990s Tarawa/Kiribas islands in the Pacific
Characters: Maarten and his girlfriend Sylvia as well as many islanders
# of Pages: 272
Where did the book come from: Recent purchase
Reason for reading the book: I had picked this up thinking my husband would like it and started reading it and was totally engrossed.
Brief Blurb: Maarten and Sylvia have no idea what they’re getting themselves into when Sylvia agrees to a two-year contact to work on Tarawa, a remote island in the equatorial Pacific.

My comments: This was LOL funny in so many places! Maarten’s turn of a phrase is so clever that he makes one laugh in the face of a nearly intolerable situation living on this remote island – part of which is so crowded it rivals Hong Kong in population density. The 20th century wasn’t kind to these islanders. Their unique culture juxtaposed with the creations of the 20th century is very nearly ruining their culture. But Troost is able to find nearly everything funny (even though one wonders if he it was that funny at the moment) including the bowel habits of the natives. On the back of the book in Maarten’s brief bio, it is revealed that he and is wife are living in California. One can only hope that he is becoming the writer for a sit-com. He makes other authors of humor/travel memoir seem dull in comparison. If I would compare him to anyone it would be Erma Bombeck—the way he is able to find hilarity in even the most mundane things.

COYOTE DREAM

COYOTE DREAM – Jessica Davis Stein
7February 2 to February 4th
Rating 9.5/10
Date Published 2004
Genre: General Fiction
# of Pages 364
Where did the book come from: Recent purchase, has been on my wish list for months
Reason for reading the book: Read a good review several months ago.

My comments:
Where do I begin? This book reeled me in from the first page. Sarah Friedman, a 30-something Jewish girl from New York who is currently in a relationship with a boyfriend (David) that’s pretty much going nowhere, offers to take her ailing father’s place for an annual art-buying trip to the Southwest. While in a store in Santa Fe, she discovers a beautiful necklace and even though her father’s gallery doesn’t sell jewelry, she is so enamored of this piece that the buys it and then tracks down the artist who made it, Ben Lonefeather. On her way to find Ben, Sarah loses control of her car and it crashes into a boulder in the desert – several miles from Ben’s remote home. Being so out of the way, her cell phone has no service, so faced with the decision to either walk to Ben’s home two miles away or two go back to the main road (a distance of about three miles) Sarah treks in her brand-new, fancy cowgirl boots on to Ben’s house. By the time she gets there she can barely walk due to the bloodied blisters on her feet. The town’s only mechanic being away for a few days, no motel available, and no public transportation, Ben reluctantly allows Sarah to stay at her place until she can get her car fixed and be on her way. What she finds at Ben’s house are three young coyotes he has rescued, a treasure trove of art and sculpture by the talented Mr. Lonefeather, and a complicated and lonely man in need of some tender loving care. But Sarah can’t stay forever and after a little over a week she is forced to return home to New York, grateful for her experience in Navajo country and leaving part of her heart behind. Soon though the time she spent in Arizona is little more than a memory and her boyfriend is finally ready to commit. Of course the reader is left knowing the relationship between Sarah and David is all wrong, but will Sarah realize it before it’s too late??? There is so much more to tell, but I being afraid of spoilers, I will just say this was a very moving read, beautifully written, and very satisfying. I loved it and hope that the author has another book coming out very soon.

CLOSE TO SHORE

CLOSE TO SHORE
Michael Capuzzo
Date Began – January 30th
Date Finished – February 2nd
Rating – B Date Published - 2001
Genre Nonfiction
# of Pages 317
Where did the book come from: Recent purchase
Reason for reading the book: I had read something about this book several years ago and then when I found it at a used book store decided to go ahead and get it. The book is an account of the shark attacks on the New Jersey shore in 1916. It’s a very detailed account, putting into over 300 pages what might be better served with a article-sized piece rather than an entire book, but it was interesting, particularly the last 1/3rd when this shark actually swam up a creek at high tide on a hot summer day attacking unsuspecting swimmers. The author had done his research and there was a lot of interesting information here about shark behavior.

WE ARE ALL FINE HERE

5) WE ARE ALL FINE HERE by Mary Guterson
January 27 – January 28th
Rating: 8/10
# pages 189
© 2005
Fiction
Recently purchased
Reason for reading: Read review and it sounded good.

When I first read a review of this book, I thought this is a book I have to have as it sounds interesting and the author lives in the town where I lived for the majority of the 1990s. So when my husband was near a local bookstore a few hours later, I asked him to pick it up for me. I was surprised when he got it home and it was so, well, small. I thought I had wasted my money on this tiny little book that I didn’t know much about. I had even thought of returning it.

But this was an amazing little book. It was so full of stark reality and LOL funny in some places. She had a dark sense of humor which I really enjoyed. Basically, Julia is a woman caught between two men – Jim, the one she married after she got pregnant with his child 16 years previously and Ray, her college sweetheart who she has never gotten out of her mind. When he calls her and asks her to accompany him to the wedding of old friends, she jumps at the chance not only to see many people she’s lost touch with, but to spend time with Ray—her true love. But when she gets pregnant and doesn’t know who the father might be as she also had one of her rare sexual encounters with her husband during this same time, things get, well, complicated.

Mary Guterson, sister of Snow Falling on Cedars author David Guterson, has an acerbic wit, and is often sarcastic as well as blunt as she writes in Julia’s point of view. My only complaint is that the book could have been longer and suffered from a few typos that threw me out of the story; but those are minor quibbles in the bigger scheme of things. I will be waiting with baited breath for her next book

PERFECT MATCH by Jodi Picoult

PERFECT MATCH by Jodi Picoult
finished 1/27
Rating 10/10
© 2002
384 pages
From personal TBR pile
Reason for reading: Have enjoyed other books by this author
Blurb: (from Amazon): In the course of her everyday work, career-driven assistant district attorney Nina Frost prosecutes child molesters and works determinedly to ensure that a legal system with too many loopholes keeps these criminals behind bars. But when her own five-year-old son, Nathaniel, is traumatized by a sexual assault, Nina and her husband, Caleb, a quiet and methodical stone mason, are shattered, ripped apart by an enraging sense of helplessness in the face of a futile justice system that Nina knows all too well. In a heartbeat, Nina's absolute truths and convictions are turned upside down, and she hurtles toward a plan to exact her own justice for her son -- no matter the consequence, whatever the sacrifice.
My comments: WOW! Jodi Picoult has done it again. This was a powerful novel. There were so many twists and turns I was getting whiplash from all the shocking surprises. And I never saw the ending coming – something that has become quite a hallmark for Jodi Picoult books. I wasn’t sure I would be comfortable reading about sexual assault on a young child and in less talented hands readers might have a really difficult time dealing with the subject matter. However emotion should be Picoult’s middle name and she is masterfully tells this story in such a way you are disgusted by the crime, but simply unable to stop reading. One has to wonder what they would have done in Nina’s shoes. She certainly had her faults, but one thing you can’t fault her for is the love for her son. This book would be great for book groups to read as there is so much here for thoughtful discussion. Another book that further justifies Picoult’s place as one of my favorite authors.

ISAAC's STORM

ISAAC’S STORM
Erik Larson
January 2005
Rating 8/10
Non-fiction
© 1999
# pages 336
From personal TBR pile
Reason for reading book: Am fascinated by stories about storms
Blurb: I’ve had this one in my TBR stack for several years now, and have even started to read it a couple of times. Whey it “took” better this time than the others I don’t know, but I do know that I couldn’t put it town. In a detailed account, Larson tells the story of the devastating Galveston hurricane of 1900 complete with details of the history of the forecasting of storms (did you know that for a time forecasters were forbidden to use the word “tornado” when forecasting a severe storm for fear of panicking people?), the ineptness of the system, the arrogance of forecasters, and the politics that came into play. Interwoven with the history of hurricanes, and this hurricane in particular, Larson recounts the tragic stories of victims and survivors. In light of the recent devastating tsunami in south Asia, the book becomes of even more interest. There have been a lot of stories about natural disasters, but few have made bestseller status as this one has, and it justly deserved its place on the bestseller lists. If you haven’t read this book yet, what are you waiting for? Erik Larson really knows how to hold the reader in his grip. Very much worth reading.

THE LANGUAGE OF SYCAMORES

THE LANGUAGE OF SYCAMORES
Lisa Wingate1/14 – 1/20
Rating: 8/10January 2004
Fiction283 pp
From Personal Collection
Reason for reading the book: The third book with similar setting by Lisa Wingate and I have loved the other two.
Blurb: After Karen looses her prestigious job, she takes the time to go visit her sister (Kate from Tending Roses) in Missouri and meet up with her pilot husband who has a lay-over there. While in Missouri she meets up with long-lost relatives, one of whom (Jenilee from Good Hope Road) has a box of letters Karen’s grandmother wrote to her grandmother over half a century previously. As secrets are revealed, Karen’s priorities return to her old values and she finds out what is really important in her life.

THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL

THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL
By Yasminda Khadra
Began: Ended January 2005
Rating: 8/10Date
Published: original – 2002, English translation 2004
Fiction195 pages
From the library
Reason for reading: 1) Nancy’s recommendation 2) After reading The Kite Runner I wasn’t ready to leave Afghanistan
Short Blurb without spoilers: It is the time of the rule of the Taliban in Afghanistan. We read of atrocities against humanity at the hands of these Muslim extremists as we meet two couples, one a jailer and his dying wife; the other a young couple who goes through a difficult time after the husband reveals a terrible thing to his wife. The wife had been a lawyer in pre-Taliban Afghanistan. She is just beside herself after her husband tells her what he did putting into place a series of events that culminate in a shocking ending. A short book, but very powerful and well worth reading.