The Dilemma by B.A. Paris

The Dilemma by B.A. Paris is about a multitude of problems in Livia and Adam’s family. Livia never got over her simple wedding to Adam after her parents disowned her for being 17 and pregnant. While spending years trying to earn her way back into their good graces, Livia has replaced her dream of a beautiful wedding with a big bash that she will save for to celebrate her 40th birthday.

Her husband Adam indulges her birthday wish but it turns out to be the hardest thing he has ever had to do because of something he knows that no one else does...so he thinks. While Adam is trying to hold things together for Livia’s sake, she is trying to protect Adam about shattering news that she’s been keeping from him. When their secrets collide, all their family and friends will be called upon to help put things right.

B.A. Paris continues to entertain her readers with page-turning plots. I could not have gone to bed without finishing this one. The author of Behind Closed Doors, The Breakdown, and Bring Me Back – I have read them all -- lives in the United Kingdom where The Dilemma is set.

Women in Sunlight by Frances Mayes

I really enjoyed Women in Sunlight by Frances Mayes the first time when I read it in 2018. This reading almost makes this aerophobe want to visit Tuscany. I'm hungry for Italian food and good wine as I reread it.

Camille and Susan are widows while Julia has left a cheating husband. They first meet on a tour of a retirement village, which they decide is not yet for them. Instead, they embark on an adventure living in a villa in Tuscany and soaking up the local life and its people. Florida-born Kit is a writer who has been living for a dozen years in Tuscany; her home is next door to the three Americans.

The novel recounts the incredible experiences of the three women from North Carolina as they explore what life still has to offer. Kit also embarks on a new awareness as her life changes.

Frances Mayes is such a lovely writer. Kit's chapters are eloquently written -- I think Kit is a portrait of the author -- while the three Americans' chapters are less literary but stil filled with vivid sensory descriptions.

Frances Mayes is best known for her book Under the Tuscan Sun. A retired professor of creative writing at San Francisco State University, where she directed The Poetry Center and chaired the Department of Creative Writing, Mayes now devotes herself full time to writing. She and her husband divide their time between North Carolina and Tuscany.

Reunion at Mossy Creek by Deborah Smith and others

Reunion at Mossy Creek is the second in the Mossy Creek series by a collective group of authors including Deborah Smith.  This collection of short stories about the people of Mossy Creek, Georgia, continues the telling of the story about how Mossy Creek High Schoool burned down at homecoming 20 years ago. 

The book is tied together with the frame story of a series of letters to a descendant of one of the MC families who now lives in England.

The stories continue to have an element of "zany" either because of funny situations or eccentric characters. The story about Ed Brady Jr. coming home to bury his mother and take care of his father was particularly touching.

While I'm not usually a short story reader, I am enjoying this series so far.

The Southern Side of Paradise by Kristy Woodson Harvey

The Southern Side of Paradise by Kristy Woodson Harvey is the final book in the Peachtree Bluff series. I have enjoyed this women's lit series. The Murphy girls: Ansley the mother, and the sisters Caroline, Sloane, and Emerson, have all had some challenges in their lives bringing them home to Peachtree Bluff to sort things out.

In this third book, the focus is on Emerson and Ansley and deals with marriage. Emerson wants to marry her high school sweetheart AND remain an LA actress. Her fiance Mark wants to be everything to Emerson, and he wants her to give up her career. Ansley has a very complicated history with her guy Jack, and Jack has alway, always loved her.

Someone will walk down the aisle but I'm not saying who.

Author Elin Hilderbrand calls Kristry Woodson Harvey "A major new voice in Southern fiction." Harvey lives in NC with her husband and son.

The Last Trial by Scott Turow

To me, Scott Turow was one of those writers who set the standards in legal thrillers. The Last Trial does not measure up to his earlier books, at least to me.

I was bogged down in all the intricacies of perfecting a drug and the trials it has to go through. I did not find the characters very likable. I did not find Sandy Stern of old to be the Sandy Stern of earlier books.

At the halfway point, I just started skimming, and nothing ever made me stop to read again. Maybe it's me and not Turow.

Gentle On My Mind by Kim Campbell

Gentle on My Mind by Kim Campbell is a highly readable memoir of the author’s life with the entertainer Glen Campbell. This is a story of fortitude for the four-time married singer who was 23 years older than his ballerina wife. They faced many challenges during their 34-year marriage including substance abuse, alcoholism, spousal abuse, and finally, Alzheimer’s disease.

A dancer at Radio City Music Hall when Kim was introduced by a friend to Campbell, she was quickly attracted to Glen although she had some misgivings. Kim had her first glimpse of his alcohol-fueled bad behavior at the end of their very first date. After a few missteps on Glen’s part, including rebounding to the singer Tanya Tucker for a brief interlude, Glen swept Kim off her dancing feet and away with him.

Kim peels away all the veneer from the relationship and exposes both the highs and the lows of their lives together. Her faith in God sustained her through the lows while other women would have left the marriage. Her story is a heart-breaking yet loving tribute to a very complicated, troubled man.

Her candid telling of Glen’s life both before she met him and through their enduring marriage is a testimony to her patience and strength. Her endurance through Glen’s decline into dementia is extraordinary as is the support of their family and friends during this nightmare experience.

Kim Campbell, the mother of three of Glen’s eight children, is the founder of Careliving.org, “a blog, lifestyle guide, and social movement designed to inspire, encourage and empower caregivers to care for themselves while caring for others.” For fans of Glen Campbell, this is a must read.

 

 

 

The Girl from Widow Hills by Megan Miranda

The Girl from Widow Hills by Megan Miranda is Arden Maynor, the subject of one of those rescue stories about a child caught in a storm drain. For years on the anniversary of the event, Arden had to deal with reporters, fans, and stalkers. Fed up with all the fame, she changed her name to Olivia Meyer and moved away from Widow Hills, Kentucky.

Olivia has not been sleepwalking for years but as the 20^th anniversary of her rescue looms, she begins sleepwalking again, and she feels like she is being watched. One night when she is asleep, she hears noises and goes out to investigate only to find a corpse. When she learns the corpse belongs to a man who was at the scene of the rescue when she was six years old, she is afraid she will be swept back into the limelight.

A twist readers will not see coming explains all the things they cannot figure out.

Megan Miranda crafts suspenseful novels like The Last House Guest, which was a pick for Reese Witherspoon’s book club. A New Jersey native, Miranda lives in North Carolina with her family.

 

 

On Ocean Boulevard by Mary Alice Monroe

On Ocean Boulevard by Mary Alice Monroe is the sixth book in the Beach House series. Just in time for summer, the novel brings Linnea Rutledge home from California to the barrier islands of Charleston, S.C. Here her Aunt Cara is about to get married again, which might mean finally giving up her mother's Primrose Cottage for a larger home for her daughter Hope and Cara's new husband.

As throughout the seres, the loggerhead turtles' journey is a subplot as Linnea gets back into the group that monitors the sea turtles. Linnea gets an internship with Aunt Cara at the aquarium and a British import may just capture her heart.

Alas, while everything is going well, tragedy strikes when a terrible illness overcomes one of the Rutledge family members causing many other things to go off-course.

Mary Alice Monroe is a long-time favorite author of beach reads. This is her 23rd novel. Monroe is a conservationist and a turtle lady in South Carolina, where she lives with her husband. They also have a hideaway in the mountains somewhere in North Carolina. Her Beach House novel was recently made into a movie on Hallmark.

Slightly South of Simple

Slightly South of Simple by Kristy Woodson Harvey is the first book in the Peachtree Bluff trilogy. The novels are about the Murphy girls: Ansley, the mother, and sisters Caroline, Sloane, and Emerson.

They were a happy family living in New York with husband and father Carter but he died in the second tower in 2001. Ansley picked up and moved to Peachtree Bluff, Georgia, to the home her grandmother left her.

Caroline is the oldest, and she moved back to New York for college, got married, and stayed in New York. Sloane married a military man and was residing in North Carolina when the story starts. Emerson is an LA actress who is visiting Peachtree Bluff as her latest film is on location in Georgia.

This novel focuses on Caroline who has returned to Peachtree Bluff after her husband James has told her he doesn't love her anymore. Seems he has a supermodel girlfriend he loves now. Caroline, who is six months pregnant, packs up and goes home to her mother with her daughter Vivi. She is not certain what the future holds.

Kristy Woodson Harvey is a Southern writer of contemporary fiction. This series is my first encounter with her. She lives in Beaufort, North Carolina, with her husband and son.

The Secret to Southern Charm by Kristy Woodson Harvey

The Secret to Southern Charm by Kristy Woodson Harvey is the second novel in the Peachtree Bluff series about three sisters and their mother.

Sloane, the middle sister, is severely depressed because her military husband is missing in action. Caroline, the oldest sister, is trying to repair her marriage after her husband’s affair with a model. Emerson, the baby, is between movies and pondering her future as an actress and with a former high school boyfriend when she is suddenly besieged by a health problem. 

Mother Ansley has opened her home in Peachtree Bluff, Georgia, to all of her girls as she tries to help them as well as take care of her aging mother. Ansley, a widow, struggles to come to terms with a man who has long loved her but is ready to completely put her out of his life.

Called by author Elin Hiderbrand "the next major voice in Southern fiction,” Kristy Woodson Harvey has found her place in wlomen’s fiction.

The Half Sister by Sandie Jones

In The Half Sister by Sandie Jones, sisters Kate and Lauren have had a contentious relationship for years. When a young woman named Jess shows up looking for her father – their father – the novel moves forward and becomes a page turner.

Kate cannot believe her father would cheat on her mother while Lauren has no doubts he would. The sisters had very different relationships with their father, who is now deceased.

Kate’s reporter instincts have her in sleuth mode as she searches for answers while Lauren immediately accepts Jess as her sister. While their mother may know something about the whole situation, she reveals little. On top of it all, Kate deals with infertility problems, which she keeps to herself, while Lauren puts on a false front to hide her troubled marriage with an emotionally abusive husband. 

Who is Jess, and why don’t her stories about college and such check out? Why is she making moves on Kate’s husband Matt? And why is her second bedroom a nursery? These and other questions are answered in The Half Sisters.

I found the ending to be abrupt and not as satisfying as it might have been. It was the twist readers expect in a Sandie Jones novel but it wasn’t as plausible as in her other books. I also had doubts about some of the information regarding DNA being used to find relatives.

Sandie Jones created a masterful page-turner with The First Mistake, which is why I was eager to read her latest book. Jones, a freelance journalist for more than 20 years, has written for the Sunday Times, Woman’s Weekly, and the Daily Mail. She lives in London with her family.

I Was Told It Would Get Easier by Abbi Waxman

I Was Told It Would Get Easier by Abbi Waxman deals with a full-time-plus working lawyer mother who is raising a teenage daughter. The pair are off for a week-long tour of colleges on the East Coast.

Jessica hopes the week will be a bonding experience with her daughter. Emily views the time as a chance to see what freedom is like even though she is not sure she even wants to go to college.

The week with a busload of parents and college-bound teens proves to be eye-opening for both mother and daughter.

When I’m looking for a funny read, I know Abbi Waxman will fulfill that desire ever since I was first introduced to her chick lit with The Garden of Small Beginnings in 2017. I went on to her next novel, Bookish Life of Nina Hill. Born in England, Waxman worked as a copywriter at various advertising agencies in London and New York. She left advertising and began writing books, TV shows, and screenplays. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and three children.

The Second Home by Christina Clancy

The Second Home by Christina Clancy refers to a Cape Cod house where the Gordon family spends every summer. One summer changes their lives forever. Fast forward to 15 years later from the life-altering summer, when sisters Ann and Poppy are trying to settle their parents’ estate, including the second home.

The situation gets complicated when their long-lost adopted brother Michael wants to keep the home as that is where he lived his best life ever. Secrets from the disastrous summer are revealed, and the challenge will be how each sibling deals with them.

This is the debut novel for Christina Clancy who spent her summers as a youth on Cape Cod in her grandparents’ house. Clancy taught English at Beloit College for almost a decade. She has written short stories and essays that have appeared in The New York Times "Modern Love" column, The Washington Post, and The Chicago Tribune. She lives in Madison, Wisconsin with her husband and has two children. I enjoyed this novel and recommend it to other lovers of women’s fiction.

Friends and Strangers by J. Courtney Sullivan

Friends and Strangers by J. Courtney Sullivan examines the lives of two women: one a new mother and the other a student at an all-girls college in New York State.

Elisabeth, a journalist before she moved from New York City to a small town, is adjusting to being a new mother and finding it hard to find time to write her next book. Sam, a college senior, who happens to love children and spent the summer as a nanny to twins, is looking for a part-time job.

Elisabeth struggles with issues with her parents and sister as well as with pressure from her husband to use their two IVF embryos. Sam grapples with making up her mind about what she is going to do after graduation: follow her ambition or marry her long-distance boyfriend?

In time, Elisabeth and Sam become friends, which is somewhat uncomfortable for Sam since she is employed by Elizabeth to take care of her baby. While the women believe they have many things in common, as time goes on, they grow aware of their differences.

J. Courtney Sullivan, a writer of women’s fiction, lives in New York with her husband and two children. Friends and Strangers is her fifth novel.

Mossy Creek by Deborah Smith and others

Mossy Creek by a collective group of authors including Deborah Smith is actually a collection of short stories about the people of Mossy Creek, Georgia, tied together with the frame story of a series of letters to a descendant of one of the MC families who now lives in England.

The stories have an element of "zany" either because of funny situations or eccentric characters. The one title "Naked Bean" was very touching and nearly brought a tear to my eye. There are nine books in the series. I will try book 2 and go from there. Author Karen White is a participant in book 4; she is the only name I have recognized.

I'm not usually a short story reader but I have enjoyed this book.

The Book of Lost Friends by Lisa Wingate

The problem with having an amazing book like Before We Were Yours that has been highly praised and lived on the best seller list for a long time is the pressure for the writer to follow-up with another outstanding book. Lisa Wingate’s The Book of Lost Friends is an okay novel but not nearly as compelling as her previous book.

Using two timelines again, Wingate unfolds the story of Hannie, a former slave, in the year 1875 on a plantation in Augustine, Louisiana, who would like to find the family she was separated from when they were sold at slave auctions. Through a series of trying circumstances involving two half-sisters who are daughters of the plantation owner, she learns about advertisements that had been placed in a publication to find separated family members, or "Lost Friends."

Fast forward to 1987 to Augustine, Louisiana, where Benny Silver is trying to work off her student loans by teaching in a school where most the children live at poverty level or below. When no relevance can be found for them in reading Animal Farm, Benny stumbles on a project that will help them to connect with their ancestors.

The intersection of the two timelines comes with the setting. Benny is renting a house on the very property where Hannie was first a slave then later a sharecropper.

Sticking with historical fiction, Lisa Wingate has used the advertisements that ran in Southern newspapers after the Civil War as a jumping off point for this story. I have read several of Wingate’s books and have found her to be a captivating writer.

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Before I Go by Colleen Oakley

There's not many places to go in the plot when stage 4 cancer in several places in the body are announced, as is the case in Before I Go by Colleen Oakley (Tull). The subplot involved the dying wife looking for a replacement wife for herself so her husband would be cared for and loved, a noble endeavor, but how realistic I wonder.

There was a twist that built some suspense but overall this author's first effort was a bit maudlin. There were a couple of plot holes that bothered me as well. How did Pamela not call out Jack for his online dating profile? How did Daisy and Jack both go to school and never work, which leads to how did they ever buy the house and how do they buy all these expensive organic foods. Implausible. 

I have read other books by Colleen Oakley, and I will continue to read her books, chalking this one up to beginner's luck.

Bells for Eli by Susan Beckham Zurenda

I just enjoyed the debut novel from Susan Beckham Zurenda called Bells for Eli, and I will keep my eye open for her future books. Readers who have ever had a crush on a cousin will take delight in this story of Adeline Green and her cousin Ellison Winfield.

In small town Green Branch, SC, the first cousins live across the street from each other in the 1960 and 1970s. Unfortunately, little Eli mistakes lye in a Coca Cola bottle for the cola drink and burns up his esophagus. His early years in school find him alternately shunned and teased because of his injury. Young Delia becomes his defender. Unbeknown to Delia, even after the physical outside wounds have healed, Eli continues to suffer from his accident and his shame from all the years of teasing, causing him to always look to challenges that will proclaim him to be a man.

This is a coming of age story in which the two encounter a multitude of trials including the Southern culture, parents, friends, bullies, and the opposite sex. Through it all, the cousins remain committed to guarding and caring for each other until another tragedy strikes.

I found myself drawn to this story from the beginning, and it was a bit of a page turner as I was eager to learn where Dee and Eli would take me.

Kudos to Zurenda on her first novel outing. I look forward to more from her. Her background includes 33 years of teaching literature, composition, and creative writing to high school and college students. This book started as a short story that won a fiction prize some years ago.

Afterlife by Julia Alvarez

I'm starting this review with a rant. If Latino authors want me to appreciate their talents in writing, they need to use appositives to balance their use of Spanish words and phrases. I'm not going to stop every little whipstitch to look up their words in a Spanish language dictionary. Not going to happen. So if they wish to convey full meaning to me, they shoulduse appositives or translations immediately after your Spanish words. It is the author's job to make the writing clear, and much was lost to me the reader in this book. End of rant.

This book is so slow anyway...basically character driven, strewn with problems presented by illegal aliens, not a topic I'm fond of, but I will try to focus mainly on the main plot. Vermont retired professor Antonio has recently lost her husband Sam; her life after Sam's death is the afterlife she is referring to plus whatever "life" he is "living" now. She has the emotional support of her three sisters, but they come with their own problems. She is bothered by the illegal next door trying to dump his problems on her. He expects her to provide a bus ticket for his illegal girlfriend...gasp, and she does!

One of the sisters gets lost, disappears, whatever to a birthday party for Antonio held at another sister's house in Chicago. The drama picks up with the search for Izzy, who has demonstrated bizarre problems of late and is "off her meds." The "action" is all very passive. Overall, I would call it dull.

This was a much anticipated novel by this author but it doesn't measure up to the hype. 

Outbound Train by Renea Winchester

The beginning of Outbound Train by Renea Winchester is a scene a reader won't forget...it made me think of John Grisham's A Time to Kill. It was so ghastly, and I wasn't expecting it at all. But sometimes good comes from evil, and that kept me on the journey.

Barbara and Carole Anne Parker are strong protagonists in this story. Barbara had dreams of leaving her small town but after an event when she was in high school, her life changed forever. Carole Ann, Barbara's daughter, also wants to leave her small town but will a tragedy change her options in life as well? This novel is a page turner in that the reader is drawn to these likable characters and hopes for the best possible outcome for them.

I was drawn to this book after reading about it in a newspaper we have mailed to us out in WNC. It is set in Bryson City, where we stayed during two different vacations. We loved the location and the town. It made for a very relaxing, laid back vacation for us as tourists but I can see where locals, especially the young, might feel the need to escape as did Barbara and Carole Anne. This mountain town and others where we visited for vacation started the process of searching for our own small mountain town to move to in retirement...and we found it about an hour from BC. We have visited BC twice since moving to the mountains as we love a local place called the Everett Street Diner (plus the chocolate shop!)

This is my first encounter with Renea Winchester, and I like her storytelling style. I will definitely keep this author on my radar.

A Stranger on the Beach by Michele Campbell

The Stranger on the Beach is my first encounter with author Michele Campbell. While the story initially held my interest, the dual telling of the same incident began to wear thin. However, the twist at the 3/4 point was a Gone Girl moment. I had bought into the con but was a little disappointed with the denouement.

I found none of the characters to be very likable. Having an affair as a means to an end was far out there, sort of an Indecent Proposal proposition. 

While I felt this book faltered a bit, I would like to try another of her books before I rule whether this author makes it to my must read list.

All the Ways We Said Goodbye by Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig, and Karen White

All the Ways We Said Goodbye by Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig, and Karen White is told using three characters following three timelines. The French heiress Aurelie’s story takes place in France in 1914 as World War I breaks out. The Resistance fighter Daisy’s tale is set during World War II. Babs, a British widow, is drawn to Paris in 1964 to solve a mystery from her war veteran husband’s life. Seemingly, the stories are connected by the Ritz Hotel in Paris…but is that the only way they are connected?

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Following three timelines is a real challenge, especially since supporting characters crossover into the stories. I found myself constantly wondering how the three main characters and timelines would finally converge.

World war novels have been enjoying a resurgence lately, and this is one of the better ones for me who is world-war-weary as the focus is not on the wars specifically but on the people who were affected by them.

This is the first book I’ve read by Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig, and  Karen White as collective authors. I was intrigued to read the book because I just heard Karen White speak at the Dahlonega Literary Festival in March before the virus hit about the process the three authors follow to write a book together. These authors previously collaborated to write The Glass Ocean and The Forgotten Room. I have read both Karen White and Beatriz Williams as lone authors and enjoyed their books.

Mr. Nobody by Catherine Steadman

Mr. Nobody has been found on a beach soaking wet with no shoes during England's winter. Taken to a hospital in Norfolk, he cannot seem to speak nor does he know who he is. Enter Dr. Emma Lewis, a neuropsychologist who specializes in memory loss.

While the assignment is a challenge for Dr. Lewis, she is put off by the location in Norfolk where she will have to return in order to oversee Mr. Nobody's case. Apparently, something happened to her in Norfolk when she was a teenager that landed her family into the witness protection program.

Thinking that she has changed so much from that traumatized teen, Dr. Lewis takes on the patient, who, while not recognizing anyone else, calls her by her former name, "Marn." Who is this man? Could he possibly be her father? Of course not as she found him in the study on that last night in Norfolk as a teen. Mr. Nobody's story will twist and turn before reaching its climax back in the house where Emma lived as a teen.

This is Catherine Steadman's second novel. I enjoyed her first book Something is in the Water (2018) that Reese Witherspoon has optioned for a movie. Steadman is also a British actress with her most famous role as Mabel Lane Fox, Mary's rival in Downton's Abbey.

The Red Lotus by Chris Bohjalian

When I saw Bohjalian had a new book out, I added it to my reading list. When I read that part of it was set in Vietnam, I started to reconsider as that country gives me the creeps because of the war that occurred there when I was in high school and after. I decided to go forward and was glad when the story returned to New York. That the book is about the release of a biological weapon was not exactly my cup of tea either in the midst of the Wuhan pandemic.

Billed as suspense fiction, it has possibilities but the rats! Not big on rats so I skimmed those parts as I did with the flashback with a character who served in Vietnam. In the end, the book is just okay, definitely not his best. I thought Secrets of Eden was well done and the end of The Flight Attendant was one I didn't see coming.

Bohjalian really wasn't on my reading list until the last five years or so. A reader in my book festival group in Indiana used to rave about him but I've only scratched the tip of the surface. I will definitely keep reading him as I am particularly interested in his earlier books.