Category: Fiction
Publisher: Little, Brown & Company
ISBN-13: 9780316018593
Pub. Date: June 2008
Date Read: July 2009
"Three women step off a plane. It sounded like the start of a joke."
Once Joshua Flynn, a twenty-two year-old college student, who becomes a baby sitter to one of the women's kids, gets to know the women he finds out that they are facing some of life's toughest choices. Although at the beginning he approached them as subjects he could analyze for his own writing, he finds that he really cares more for them than he ever imagined he would.
Vicki, who is mom to the two children, decided to spend the summer in Nantucket against her husband's and doctor's wishes. She knows that with the sand beneath her feet, she can gain some perspective for what really matters in life. Vicki, you see, has just learned she has lung cancer.
Brenda is Vicki's sister and she comes in part to support Vicki and taker her to her treatments, but she's also fleeing the city after a scandalous affair with one of her students and a debacle with the university. She's thinks the beach will help her focus her energies on writing.
Melanie is more of Vicki's friend and she eagerly accepted to accompany Vicki and Brenda when Vicki finds out her husband has been cheating on her. And, now after several failed attempts at in vitro, she's pregnant. Will she forgive her husband or find love somewhere else?
As summer progresses the lives of the three women and Josh become more entwined. Some learn to rely more on help, or to let go of expectations, and some even learn to love.
While it's easy to understand why the women characters chose to spend a summer on the beach getting away from it all, I found that I never really believed that they had bonded over the trip. But what put me off the most, were some of the characters who I often found a bit infuriating and didn't care for at all. But if you like beach stories with a bit of romance then this might be the book for you.