Category Archives: Authors F-J

Review: The Naked Gardener, by L B Gschwandtner

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The Naked Gardener
The Naked Gardener
L B Gschwandtner
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Summary (from Amazon.com):
In a remote forest of northern Vermont, Katelyn Cross takes five women on a wilderness canoe trip where they hope to come up with ideas for saving their dying town. Although the river is not always what it seems and the women have not left their problems behind, a painting ritual creates a new way to look at the world – and themselves. Artist Katelyn Cross loves Greg Mazur and he loves her. He wants to be married but a previous relationship that went sour has made Katelyn overly cautious about any permanent commitment. And what about Greg’s first wife? He lost her to cancer and Katelyn worries that he’s only looking for a replacement. What’s a girl to do? Canoe down a river with five gal pals, camp out, catch fish, talk about life and men. The problem is, a river can be as unpredictable as any relationship and just as hard to manage. On their last day, when the river turns wild, the women face the challenge of a lifetime and find that staying alive means saving themselves first while being open to help from a most unlikely source. As Katelyn navigates the raging water, she learns how to overcome her fear of change in a world where nothing stays the same. When Katelyn returns to her garden, she’ll face one more obstacle and the naked gardener will meet the real Greg Mazur. What readers are saying about The Naked Gardener: Lyrical … Scandalous … Empowering … Exhilarating … Honest … Sensual … Fun … Gentle … Pleasurable … Transporting … Timeless In her first novel, award winning writer L B Gschwandtner explores the push and pull of love, a woman’s need to maintain her individuality within marriage, and the bonds that can make women stronger even when the world feels as if it’s breaking apart.

I’ve known L B Gschwandtner through her wonderful website The Novelette for several years now, but only in the very cursory way that people who occupy overlapping circles do. I’ve participated in her contests, she’s visited my blog, etc. Even so, when she announced the publication of her first novel, I had to read it. Lucky for me, it’s available for the kindle for less than a dollar, though it’s totally worth the print-edition price of $10.99.

I actually started reading The Naked Gardener the day I downloaded it, a couple of weeks ago, but I had a stack of review books with deadlines that had to come first. I revisited it over the weekend, and ended up staying up to the wee hours because the story caught me, and held me so tightly that I had to finish it immediately. I really loved the idea of Katelyn naked in her garden – it struck me as something my mother would do, and I liked the women Katelyn befriends. I think Maze could be interesting but we heard about him more than we heard from him, and while that’s fairly normal in a story that focuses on women, I hope he’s a bit more present in the next novel.

If you’ve ever wanted to run away to a rural farm, have a canoe adventure, or just share stories with a bunch of new friends, or even if you’ve already done all those things, this novel is one you’ll enjoy, both for the obvious story, and the deeper one, about finding yourself, facing your fears, and learning to accept and love yourself as you are, not as you wish you were. I can’t begin to speculate about the best diet pill for women, but I am fairly certain that Katelyn, Erica, and the rest of the women in this novel would never touch them, but would instead take off down the river, or start a project, or have another candid conversation, and never care that dieting might be in order.

I don’t think you have to garden naked to appreciate The Naked Gardener, but I’m certain that it will inspire many of us to try it at least once. I don’t have a garden, but I do have a very private back yard with just the right amount of sun (at least at this time of year)…this book reminded me of why I love that privacy so much.

Goes well with freshly-baked artisan bread and local honey.

Review: Driftwood Lane, by Denise Hunter

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Driftwood Lane
Driftwood Lane
Denise Hunter
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Summary (from Amazon):
Meridith can handle anything: guardianship of three distant siblings, a dilapidated Bed-and-Breakfast, even an ever-present handyman who’s dismantling more than her fireplace–or can she?

When the death of Meridith’s estranged father leaves her with custody of three siblings she’s never met, she reluctantly goes to Nantucket to care for them–but only until their uncle returns from his trip. Little does she know, the uncle is already there under the guise of her friendly handyman, with plans of his own.

Will the love that grows between them be strong enough to overcome the secrets that brought them both to Driftwood Lane?

After a summer spent devouring everything Elin Hilderbrand had ever written, you might think I’d had enough of novels set on Nantucket Island, but as a 3rd generation beach baby, I can never get enough of seaside settings. For me, reading about the beach is like a wannabe modern nomad comparing rates on rv loans: I can never get enough of them.

Denise Hunter’s Driftwood Lane is, in many ways, the perfect seaside romance. 25-year-old Meridith shows great strength and great love in giving up her life in St. Louis to act as caretaker for the three half-siblings she’s never met – or even heard of – until the day she’s informed that her father and his second wife have died in a tragic accident. The bed-and-breakfast where the kids live, Summer Place, while desperate for some TLC, is on the beach, and perfectly represents those too-cute beachfront homes I’ve always wanted to rent, and never have.

Then there’s Jake, the dashing handyman/love interest. He’s fiery and passionate, a bit mysterious (at least to Meridith), and kind of a rogue, but also tender, and his scenes with Meridith are full of hilarious bickering, misunderstandings, and a requisite number of warm, friendly, almost tingly moments.

The children, Noelle, Max and Ben, are well-written, also, with the right blend of brattiness covering their fear, but a sweetness to them as well.

I enjoyed the quick pace of Driftwood Lane. I’m generally a fast reader, anyway, but this book moved along at a really nice clip, and though I had moments where I found certain plot points a bit implausible, I merely reminded myself that this is a romance novel, and some level of willful suspension of disbelief was therefore required.

It should be noted that though this book is categorized as Christian fiction, and references God in the back-cover blurb, there was nothing in it that felt overwhelmingly religious, and nothing at ALL preachy. A few characters mentioned church, or leaving things up to God, but, speaking as someone who isn’t particularly Christian, I didn’t find any of it off-putting, though non-religious readers will want to avoid the Reading Group Guide at the end.

All in all, I thought Driftwood Lane was an entertaining, escapist read, and while I have not read any of Denise Hunter’s previous three Nantucket novels, I wouldn’t object to doing so in the future.

Goes well with strong tea and oatmeal-raisin cookies

Review: A Summer Affair, by Elin Hilderbrand

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A Summer Affair

A Summer Affair
by Elin Hilderbrand

This novel is both the seventh novel the author wrote, and the seventh of her novels that I read, but that happened purely by coincidence. I hadn’t read any of the others in order of publication date.

Unlike many of the other protagonists in Hilderbrand’s work, Claire Danner Crispin, art-glass blower, wife, and mother, is a full-time resident of Nantucket, where she and her husband have a relatively happy life, though she harbors a secret – she feels responsible for a car accident that her friend Daphne was in several months before.

When Claire is invited to co-chair a charity gala and create a new art piece for the auction attached thereto, she’s surprised, because the the person in charge of the charity, Lockhart, is Daphne’s husband, and Claire had assumed he held her responsible as well.

As the title implies, Claire and Lockhart begin an affair, which heats up as problems plague the gala planning, and Claire’s rockstar ex-boyfriend arrives to stay at her house (he’s the big draw for the gala, as well as the entertainment).

There’s also a B-plot between Claire’s best friend, a caterer, and her gambling husband.

In the end, A Summer Affair, is a typical Hilderbrand novel with great beach-town settings, well-written women, and men who lack depth, though they’ve improved somewhat in this novel. Both Claire’s husband and the rockstar boyfriend seem like decent men.

Goes well with lemonade and quiche

Retro-reading: Star Trek: Traitor Winds, by L. A. Graf

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Star Trek: Traitor Winds

Star Trek: Traitor Winds
by L. A. Graf

A few weeks ago, I was desperate for some escapist comfort reading. You might think that reading half of everything Elin Hilderbrand had ever written would count as comfort reading, but it doesn’t. Hilderbrand’s Nantucket novels are beach reading. I wanted something light, familiar, and completely unrelated to my real life. I wanted comfort reading. As I often do – and have no problem admitting – I immersed myself in a Star Trek novel. Since I was also feeling nostalgic, I re-read a classic Star Trek novel, from when they were still being numbered: Traitor Winds by L. A. Graf

This is TOS Trek, not Trek 2009, and it takes place between the TV series and the first movie. Newly promoted Admiral Kirk is stuck behind a desk in San Francisco, Sulu is testing stealth shuttles in New Mexico, McCoy is practicing country medicine (when he has to) in Georgia, and Uhura is leading a communications seminar, teaching at Starfleet Academy, and Scotty is overseeing the refit of the Enterprise. And Chekov? Well, he was turned down for command school because he was too young, and chose to enter security school in Annapolis, instead.

During one of their regular get-togethers for dinner, McCoy suggests that Chekov contact a friend of his who is doing a study of disruptor damage in order to develop treatment. Despite taking flak for it from a more senior student at the Security School, Chekov gets the gig, and winds up involved in a murder investigation, and running for his life, hiding, at one point, among the wild ponies on Assateague Island (apparently Graf grew up reading the Misty books, too).

It’s a novel that takes place in winter, mostly in really cold places, and more than once I wished I was reading it while curled in front of the fire in a cozy chalet filled with log furniture, instead of while curled up in a deck chair by the pool (I know, I should complain, right?), but it was nice revisiting characters I grew up with, in a familiar setting with a twist, and I enjoyed re-reading it immensely.

Mini-reviews: Three by Elin Hilderbrand

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I’ve been reading a lot of Elin Hilderbrand’s work this summer. In fact, I think I now own all of her Nantucket novels, though I still have at least three left to read. These novels, which are not a series, but are all set on the island of Nantucket, are easing my yen for the beach the way the best weight loss pills help you shed pounds safely.

Here’s a brief wrap-up of the last three Hilderbrand novels I’ve read:

The Castaways

The Castaways is the story of four successful couples, all friends for years, who refer to themselves collectively as The Castaways. When one of the couples dies in a tragic boating accident, secrets about the intertwining relationships among the surviving six people then come out. This was a deliciously dishy novel about affairs of the heart and the flesh, and it’s much more satisfying a read than I thought it would be.

Nantucket Nights

Nantucket Nights starts out being a story about female bonding, when three long-time friends meet for their annual ritual of Midnight Swimming, off a remote stretch of beach, after the summer season is officially over, but one of them doesn’t come back from the swim. All three women, Val, Kayla and Antoinette, are distinctly different but still strong personalities, but I thought the mystery element of the plot was a bit predictable.

Summer people

Summer People is the most recent novel I’ve finished reading, and while I enjoyed it, it felt a little unfinished. While the adult storyline is a little weak – that of Beth grieving over her dead husband while being confronted almost daily with her former lover, a year round Nantucket resident, as opposed to she and her family who are summer people – the teen storyline is a little meatier: Beth’s twin teen children, Winnie and Garrett each deal with grief and first love during their summer, Winnie with Marcus, the son of her dad’s last client, and Garrett with his mother’s ex-lover’s daughter. Like Nantucket Nights, this novel includes an unwanted pregnancy story, and the pair leave me suspecting that author Hildebrand is anti-choice, but despite that, her stuff is wonderful summer reading.

Goes well with: Fresh caught saltwater fish, grilled, with summer veggies, and either lemonade, iced tea, or beer.

Review: Hope in a Jar, by Beth Harbison

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Hope in a Jar
Hope in a Jar
by Beth Harbison
St. Martin’s Griffin, 368 pages
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When I saw Beth Harbison’s novel Hope in a Jar staring at me from the summer reading table at the bookstore, I didn’t connect the title with the Philosophy product at all, mainly because I haven’t used Philosophy in over a decade. I’m an Aveda girl, for the most part, although I’ve been branching out a little lately.

Just a few chapters into the sometimes fluffy, sometimes deadly serious story about Allie and Olivia – childhood best friends who part ways over a dark rumor only to reconnect at their 20-year high school reunion – I realized that this writer was my contemporary in more ways than one, and not just because of the dialogue that covered everything from fat burners that really work to which flavor of Lip Smackers is the coolest (I liked root beer, personally), but because I actually recognized every single pop-culture reference in her story.

There’s comfort in the familiar, which is why even though the plot was fairly predictable, I enjoyed this novel immensely. Books don’t always have to have a lofty purpose, or educate a starving mind. Sometimes, it’s okay to read for the sheer pleasure of being entertained, and Harbison excels at entertaining. Sure, I figured out the ending way before the end of the book, but I still enjoyed watching the characters get there, because the dialogue was spot on, the relationships made sense, and the descriptions were so vivid (as vivid as many of the outfits we all wore as children in the 1970s and 1980s) that it was almost like attending my own 20-year high school reunion, without any of the attendant angst.

Hope in a Jar made me laugh out loud, a lot, and sometimes, that’s what a book SHOULD do. I haven’t read any of Harbison’s other work, but I know that when I do, I’ll enjoy it immensely.

Goes well with: Steak-ums sandwiches and cold Tab

Review: The Blue Bistro, by Elin Hilderbrand

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The Blue Bistro
The Blue Bistro
by Elin Hilderbrand
St. Martin’s Griffin, 336 pages
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The Blue Bistro may be the fourth of author Elin Hilderbrand’s novels set on the island of Nantucket, but it’s only the second I’ve read. Thankfully, her novels are not a series, as much as they are a collection. Most don’t even mention the same restaurants.

In any case, this novel, which is set in and around a beach front restaurant, (restaurant books are not the best appetite suppressants, by the way), tells the story of 28-year-old Adrienne Dealey, freshly off the Colorado ski slopes, where she worked as the concierge in a tone-y hotel, and looking for a new life, without her old lover, who wasn’t good for her. Telling is the fact that she misses the dog, more than the man.

Having been advised to try Nantucket for the summer, Adrienne begins looking for work, and in the process, meets Thatcher Smith, who co-owns the famous Blue Bistro with his childhood friend, the reclusive, but amazingly talented, Fiona Kemp. What follows is part hard work, part romance, and part mystery – what hold does Fiona have on Thatcher, that he can’t (or won’t) even spend the entire night with Adrienne after they become lovers?

As is expected of Hilderbrand novels, there is sophisticated, realistic romance set against the charming backdrop of Nantucket in the summertime.

You can almost feel the salt in your hair.

Goes well with: Champagne and lobster tails.

Review: Barefoot, by Elin Hilderbrand

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Barefoot"
Barefoot
by Elin Hilderbrand
Little, Brown and Company, 528 pages
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Last month when I got home from Mexico, and had the opportunity to splurge on books, I looked for beach reading – books that took place in cute coastal villages. I’d been eying the paperback version of Elin Hilderbrands’s sixth Nantucket novel Barefoot for months, and finally brought it home on that trip. I didn’t actually read it it until the beginning of June, however, and when I did, it took a while before I was hooked. This is a novel that starts slowly, cresting like the gentlest of waves.

I don’t mind that sort of novel – sometimes they can be really satisfying reading – and I also didn’t mind that this was really an extended character piece. It begins, of course, with three women, Vicki, Brenda and Melanie, arriving on Nantucket for a summer in the cottage that Vicki and Brenda (sisters) inherited from their aunt. Melanie’s along for the ride because she’s a friend of Vicki’s. Each woman comes with baggage of the figurative kind as well as actual luggage. For Vicki, it’s cancer – she’ll be having chemo while summering by the shore. Brenda was a hotshot professor at a small, private university, fired for having an affair with her student (it should be noted that this isn’t a creepy kind of affair – her student was older than she was – but it was a professional faux pas). And Melanie…Melanie is newly pregnant, but because her husband is having an affair he refuses to end, the only birth announcements she’s made – or pregnancy announcements, for that matter, are to the other women with her on the trip, and, within a couple of chapters, the young islander Josh, who first greets them at the airport, then ends up becoming whatever the male version of an au pair is, since Vicki came with her two young children.

During the summer, Brenda works on the book/screenplay that she hasn’t been able to focus on elsewhere, Vicki becomes empowered with regard to her disease, and Melanie has a summer fling with young Josh.

None of these things are at all surprising, nor is the ending of the novel remotely unpredictable, but sometimes you don’t need a great twist for a novel to be satisfying; sometimes, all you need are vivid descriptions, three-dimensional characters (even when you find some of their behavior a bit annoying), and a cute coastal village. Hilderbrand provides all of those.

Goes well with: lemonade and a tuna sandwich from inside a picnic cooler at the beach.

Review: Dead in the Family

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Dead in the Family
by Charlaine Harris
Ace Hardcover, 320 pages
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Even though it’s been less than two weeks since I’ve read Charlaine Harris’ latest addition to the Sookie Stackhouse / Southern Vampire Mystery series, I don’t remember much about it. I don’t mean that I didn’t enjoy it, because I did, or that it wasn’t well-written, because it was, but that it seemed like it didn’t really have a definitive plot. Oh, I mean, there was a stray faerie, and an unidentified shifter, but most of the book seemed transitional.

For example: Sookie is dealing with the aftermath of losing her “fairy godmother,” forging a relationship with her young cousin, who shares her ability, trying to find boundaries in her relationships with Eric (romantic) and Bill (who, quaintly, is still referred to as Vampire Bill by most of the folks at Merlotte’s, but, while there’s some wrapping up of loose threads, and some setup of future events, book ten feels very much like the middle novel of a trilogy, making it one of the rare books in this series that HAS to be read in order or the reader will be left completely confused.

Diehard Sookie Stackhouse fans will not want to miss this book, which came out six weeks ago (giving book clubs enough time to discuss it before last Sunday’s beginning of season three of True Blood), but I’m left feeling like the story wasn’t complete. Less is more, of course, as the adage goes, but…this book included a visit to Eric’s house, and I’m not certain if I know whether or not his taste runs to modern furniture, or something much more exotic.

Goes well with: peach pie and sweet tea.

Review: Prairie Tale

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Prairie Tale
Prairie Tale: a Memoir
Melissa Gilbert
Gallery, 384 pages
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I’ve been a fan of Melissa Gilbert ever since the first episode of “Little House of the Prairie” first aired, but I hadn’t realized she’d published her memoir until I saw it for sale among the souvenirs of “Little House on the Prairie: the Musical” several weeks ago. I ended up buying the trade paperback version, and reading it in one night.

In Prairie Tale Gilbert starts with her childhood as a kid in pigtails going to commercial auditions, and walks us through the grittiest details of her life until now. She speaks wryly about her nervousness about the kissing scenes and love scenes with Dean Butler, who played Almanzo on the show, and candidly about her first serious relationship, with Rob Lowe. She shares her dreams, and also shares her struggle with the loss of Michael Landon, and her deeper struggles with both self esteem and alcohol. If she’d been using Lipovox, she’d have written about that too, no doubt.
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In the end, this book does what a good memoir should: it makes us feel as if we’ve had a long chat with someone we once wished we could be friends with.

Goes well with strong coffee and a slice of corn bread.