Another satisfying summer read from the queen of the beach.
A single-mom lawyer takes on the case of a mysterious elderly woman in this novel full of friendship and nostalgia.
When Brooke Trappnell gets a call from 99-year-old Josephine Bettendorf Warrick, she doesn’t know what the peculiar millionaire could want with her. There are more successful lawyers in her coastal Georgia town, and the two have never met. But since Brooke is broke and desperate to put food on the table for her 3-year-old son, she takes a boat out to Talisa Island to speak with Josephine in her crumbling mansion. It turns out that Josephine is dying, and she wants to keep the state from taking her land and tearing down her house for a conference center or something like that after she’s gone. Cantankerous Josephine wants the island to go to her three oldest, dearest friends—Millie, Ruth, and Varina, the High Tide Club girls. The women were estranged for decades, and two of them are dead, but Josephine wants Brooke to track down the only living High Tide Club girl and the descendants of the others and bring them to Talisa so she can make amends. Josephine is keeping many secrets, about why she wants to make amends and about an unsolved murder that occurred on the island years ago, but she dies before she can explain anything—or sign her will . Now, the group of women must find a way to save Josephine’s island from being taken over by the state—which involves finding out exactly what happened in Josephine’s past. Andrews (The Weekenders, 2016, etc.) creates a story that is at turns suspenseful, sad, and hopeful, with plenty of surprising twists. Her dialogue is natural and funny, and even her minor characters are fully drawn with unique voices. The slight romantic thread between Brooke and her former boyfriend could be more detailed, but the focus is mainly on the friendships, old and new, between the members of the High Tide Club and their descendants.
Another satisfying summer read from the queen of the beach.Pub Date: May 8, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-250-12606-1
Page Count: 448
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: March 5, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2018
Packed with riveting drama and painful truths, this book powerfully illustrates the devastation of abuse—and the strength of...
Hoover’s (November 9, 2015, etc.) latest tackles the difficult subject of domestic violence with romantic tenderness and emotional heft.
At first glance, the couple is edgy but cute: Lily Bloom runs a flower shop for people who hate flowers; Ryle Kincaid is a surgeon who says he never wants to get married or have kids. They meet on a rooftop in Boston on the night Ryle loses a patient and Lily attends her abusive father’s funeral. The provocative opening takes a dark turn when Lily receives a warning about Ryle’s intentions from his sister, who becomes Lily’s employee and close friend. Lily swears she’ll never end up in another abusive home, but when Ryle starts to show all the same warning signs that her mother ignored, Lily learns just how hard it is to say goodbye. When Ryle is not in the throes of a jealous rage, his redeeming qualities return, and Lily can justify his behavior: “I think we needed what happened on the stairwell to happen so that I would know his past and we’d be able to work on it together,” she tells herself. Lily marries Ryle hoping the good will outweigh the bad, and the mother-daughter dynamics evolve beautifully as Lily reflects on her childhood with fresh eyes. Diary entries fancifully addressed to TV host Ellen DeGeneres serve as flashbacks to Lily’s teenage years, when she met her first love, Atlas Corrigan, a homeless boy she found squatting in a neighbor’s house. When Atlas turns up in Boston, now a successful chef, he begs Lily to leave Ryle. Despite the better option right in front of her, an unexpected complication forces Lily to cut ties with Atlas, confront Ryle, and try to end the cycle of abuse before it’s too late. The relationships are portrayed with compassion and honesty, and the author’s note at the end that explains Hoover’s personal connection to the subject matter is a must-read.
Packed with riveting drama and painful truths, this book powerfully illustrates the devastation of abuse—and the strength of the survivors.Pub Date: Aug. 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5011-1036-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Roberts does it again with this fast-paced romantic mystery that's both steamy and thrilling, despite its somewhat obvious...
Beautiful Italian babe with a passion for fire and doomed hunks joins the arson squad and discovers that someone has held a torch for her since she was a child.
When Reena Hale is 11 years old, she watches her family's Baltimore pizzeria go up in flames. Thanks to a local arson detective, John Minger, and the girl's keen memory, police determine that a neighborhood crook whose young son had recently attacked Reena was out for revenge, and soon cops publicly haul the dirt bag off to jail. The large and loving Hale family bands together and rebuilds; Reena grows up curious about the origins of fire. She attends college and, after her boyfriend dies in an accident, joins the police force and learns the inner workings of the fire department. Eventually, she teams with Minger to solve the city's suspicious fires. Meanwhile, over the years, a shady character has been hiding in the shadows, waiting for the right moment to violently sabotage Reena's relationships (usually with the help of explosives). Somehow Reena doesn't put together that all of her boyfriends have been in the path of catastrophic (occasionally deadly) events, so her stalker hits the phone lines to clue her in with dirty messages that become more and more intimate. When Reena launches a torrid love affair with her new neighbor, whose truck soon explodes, she begins to get it. Fearing for her family's safety, Reena reopens past cases and learns that her troubles started when she was a child. The tale builds to a breathless climax as she (literally) races to beat out the flames of one fire before determining where the next one will be set.
Roberts does it again with this fast-paced romantic mystery that's both steamy and thrilling, despite its somewhat obvious nature.Pub Date: Oct. 4, 2005
ISBN: 0-399-15306-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2005
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
