Kendrick brings her signature breezy style and witty charm to another poignant and romantic love story.
When her former fiance marries someone he's just met, a woman who's used to playing it safe throws caution to the wind on a visit to Black Dog Bay, the Delaware beach town deemed the best place in America to get over a breakup.
Brighton Smith has crafted the perfect, safe life. While she once dreamed of taking over her grandfather’s jewelry business, those hopes were dashed when her free-spirited mother ran it into the ground. Learning early to be responsible, she became an actuary and is engaged to Colin, who’ll be an attorney as soon as he passes the bar exam. When a silly argument escalates into a huge fight, Colin asks for his ring back, then heads out of town for a study session. Brighton decides to visit Kira, a college roommate who just moved to Black Dog Bay. When the two meet up at a local wine shop, Brighton is introduced to Jake Sorenson, Black Dog Bay’s resident sexy, rich bachelor and “designated rebound guy for all the newly single women.” Brighton feels the tug of attraction but ignores it until Kira has to take a call from a client at the same time Colin calls to tell her he’s met someone else and married her. Tossing off her sensible armor, she accepts Jake’s offer of a drink, which leads to a late-night flight to Vegas and a quickie marriage. Stunned by her choices, she's further astounded when Jake encourages her to enjoy the moment while it lasts. Brighton knows hopes and wishes are a bad bet, so she should nip them in the bud before they take hold. But somehow, her one night of risk seems to be leading to everything she ever wanted. Can any of it last?
Kendrick brings her signature breezy style and witty charm to another poignant and romantic love story.Pub Date: Nov. 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-451-47418-6
Page Count: 320
Publisher: New American Library
Review Posted Online: Sept. 22, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
An unusual and mesmerizing novel, gracefully written and deeply disturbing.
In her first novel to be published in English, South Korean writer Han divides a story about strange obsessions and metamorphosis into three parts, each with a distinct voice.
Yeong-hye and her husband drift through calm, unexceptional lives devoid of passion or anything that might disrupt their domestic routine until the day that Yeong-hye takes every piece of meat from the refrigerator, throws it away, and announces that she's become a vegetarian. Her decision is sudden and rigid, inexplicable to her family and a society where unconventional choices elicit distaste and concern that borders on fear. Yeong-hye tries to explain that she had a dream, a horrifying nightmare of bloody, intimate violence, and that's why she won't eat meat, but her husband and family remain perplexed and disturbed. As Yeong-hye sinks further into both nightmares and the conviction that she must transform herself into a different kind of being, her condition alters the lives of three members of her family—her husband, brother-in-law, and sister—forcing them to confront unsettling desires and the alarming possibility that even with the closest familiarity, people remain strangers. Each of these relatives claims a section of the novel, and each section is strikingly written, equally absorbing whether lush or emotionally bleak. The book insists on a reader’s attention, with an almost hypnotically serene atmosphere interrupted by surreal images and frighteningly recognizable moments of ordinary despair. Han writes convincingly of the disruptive power of longing and the choice to either embrace or deny it, using details that are nearly fantastical in their strangeness to cut to the heart of the very human experience of discovering that one is no longer content with life as it is.
An unusual and mesmerizing novel, gracefully written and deeply disturbing.Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-553-44818-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Hogarth
Review Posted Online: Oct. 19, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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