Been reading quite a few serious books of late. So decided to do some light reading. :-)A mystery cum romance, The Beach Tree is a very readable book. I really liked the way it weaves the story of hope and courage of ordinary people, who get hit by the fury of nature time and again and still pick...
I wanted to like this book. After all, it is set in Charleston, SC. But I really, really didn't. I was a little worried about whether I would like the main character when she admitted to spending an afternoon organizing her wardrobe by designer. Then she is broke, but has a housekeeper. Then ...
Excellent series, rating is Characters/Personal interactions 5, mystery 3.75 (they were busy with the personal), voicing 5.Metadata: Southern, Mystery, Ghosts, Historical, Family, Romance (Romance being last because it was just a flicker in books 1 & 2)I loved this series, the characters really ...
And the golden bees / were making white combs / and sweet honey / from my old failures.” Antonio Machado —NED BLOODWORTH’S BEEKEEPER’S JOURNAL Georgia Bees buzzed and flitted around my head. I counted each one as I’d done as a child, lulling me into a sweet space where I c...
She threw open the door and went in, blinking at the bright sunlight streaming in from the windows and illuminating the colorful palette on the walls and furnishings. Sara sat propped up in her bed on large, fluffy pillows with her father in a chair on one side and Earlene on the other. At Tucker...
The sheets and blankets were lying in puddles around the bed and all four windows were wide open, long vermilion drapes fluttering like moths inside the room. Gathering the little dog to my chest, I struggled to close the windows, then returned to the bed for another twenty minutes, this time wit...
He hopped out and opened the passenger side as I approached. I felt the telltale pricking of the skin at the back of my neck as I slid into the car, deliberately keeping my head turned away from the turret window. As I buckled my seat belt, the scent of Rebecca’s perfume assaulted me, followed qu...
—MARCEL PROUST The sound of approaching hoofbeats made me glance up. I shielded my eyes with a hand to block the glare of the summer sun and watched Stuart approach astride Endy. The sweat ran in rivulets down my back, making my chemise stick to my skin. I adjusted the egg basket on my arm and wa...
The broken pediments over the windows gave the house a permanent frown, yet the leaf-filtered sun against the chipped Tower-of-the-Winds columns lining the side piazzas painted the house with hope. It was almost, I thought, as if the house were merely waiting for a miracle. &nbs...
Cranking up the air-conditioning, Emmy pointed the vents toward her face as she searched, realizing she’d have been better off leaving her car at the store instead of going home first to change. The yellow sundress fit her perfectly, although she felt self-conscious exposi...
Jungmann, and his face always brightened when Olive walked into his shop on Lexington Avenue and Sixty-fourth Street to place the order for the next day’s vegetables. She liked that. How nice it was, to escape from the House of Disapproval—frowning housekeepers, frowning cooks, frowning Prunella ...
With her other hand she rubbed her lower back and watched Debbie Fuller—now Deborah, since she was a mature twenty-five—yank out another clump of weeds. It had been a rainy spring, the dampness bringing with it a bumper crop of mosquitoes and weeds. Deborah caught Edith wa...
Finn and his daughter waited at the end of the dock next to the two kayaks, both in mint condition despite being two decades old. Finn wore shorts and dock shoes, a baseball hat and sunglasses. Gigi had on a similar outfit, but in varying shades of pink. Even her dock shoes were pink patent leath...
I haven’t really felt like this for a long time, at least not since Bootsie came back when I was six and reminded me all over again that there was something about me that made people want to leave me behind. My friend JoEllen Parker buried her daddy last Saturday, which go...