A Summer Place

Summerland: A Novel by Elin Hilderbrand (Reagan Arthur Books, $26.99, 400 pages)

Life can be traumatic and daunting even on Nantucket Island, the idyllic summer vacation destination for generations of families, including the wealthy and famous like Martha Stewart.   These are the summer people who see the island as an escape from reality.   Of course on Nantucket, like any resort, there must be the year-round residents who live their lives in full on the island 30 miles from the mainland.

Elin Hilderbrand knows of what she writes.   As a resident, she knows the year-around version of island life.   Summerland is the eleventh novel based in her neck of the woods.   Two of her most recent past novels, Silver Girl and The Island have been reviewed on this site.   Both of these reviews were based on the audio versions of the books.   Each was superb; however, the magic of seeing the story in hard copy was most evident for this book.

The narrative is written from the perspective of each of the main characters, including Nantucket.   There are two generations represented here, teenagers and their parents.   This time around the human experiences up for exploration are death, loss, parenting and children.   Both generations are subjected to the fallout effects when the golden girl of her class, Penny Alistair, dies in a horrific auto crash on high school graduation night.   Her twin brother Hobby, short for Hobson, is mangled and left in a coma.   Two other juniors, Jake and Demeter escape unscathed.

The story line is believable and somewhat predictable but it is the way the characters are developed that makes this a compelling read.   Regardless of the reader’s age, adult or young adult, the very poignant lessons learned are delivered in a manner that’s achievable only by a master story teller. 

Highly recommended.

Ruta Arellano

A review copy was provided by the publisher.

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A review of Summerland: A Novel by Elin Hilderbrand.

Chapter One

One of the books we missed this year – but still hope to read – was The End of the Wasp Season: A Novel by Denise Mina (Reagan Arthur Books, $25.99, 400 pages; also available as a Kindle Edition or Nook Book download.)   Ian Rankin has called Mina, “The most exciting crime writer to have emerged in Britain for years.”  Click on this link to read Chapter One of The End of the Wasp Season:

http://www.denisemina.co.uk/contents/books/endofthewasp_ch1.htm

Joseph Arellano

I’m Looking Through You

Silver Girl: A Novel by Elin Hilderbrand (Reagan Arthur Books; $26.99; 416 pages.   Hachette Audio, $19.98; 12 CDs.)

Elin Hilderbrand has placed her characters in Silver Girl on Nantucket Island in homage to its healing properties.   The island is her home which makes the depth of details and atmospheric descriptions nearly magical.   Clearly, writing well about what you know is more than just reporting what the author sees; rather, the emotional connections are more powerful when the soul of the location is translated into words.   Ms. Hilderbrand seems to refine this talent with each subsequent novel.   (A review of The Island: A Novel, a prior work, was posted on this site.)   This reviewer listened to the unabridged audio version of Silver Girl narrated by Janet Metzger and Marianne Fraulo.   Each of these women has a wide range of vocal ability which made listening to the book a delightful and satisfying experience.

In a way this novel is historical fiction, and in another it is a cautionary tale.   The Bernie Madoff pyramid scheme revelation and the subsequent meltdown of many investor fortunes provide the general premise.   Ms. Hilderbrand uses one of her writing strengths, portraying well-developed female characters, to tell a variation of the wife’s side of the scandal.   The reader cannot help but hear the Paul Harvey intonation, “And now, the rest of the story…” as the plight of Meredith Martin Delinn unfolds following the arrest of her husband, Freddy Delinn for bilking investors out of billions of dollars.

Meredith Martin was the talented, studious and obedient Main Line Philadelphia daughter whose aquatic diving and academic skills were superior.   She met and married Freddy, an ambitious student from lesser means, while on the rebound from being dumped by her first love, Toby.   Although the interactions of the characters, their motivations and the impact they have on each other are vital to the life of a story, it is the way that each of them perceives his or her choices in life that makes this story connect with the reader.

Perhaps Meredith’s blind acceptance of authority, first that of her doting parents, and subsequently that of her husband, Freddy, set her up to be collateral damage from the collapse of the pyramid scheme.   Or, maybe it was the knowledge that her actions in life required no courage or daring.   Living a role prescribed for you may be easier than creating your own; however, eventually the shallowness and dissatisfaction must emerge from under the seemingly safe exterior.   In Meredith’s case, worldwide infamy provided her the opportunity to create her own life.   For others of us it may come in the form of a soul mate who appears to lead the way to a better life.

Even if you might be tired of the Madoff story, know that this spin is well worth the read.

Highly recommended.

Ruta Arellano

A review copy of the audiobook (originally priced at $34.98) was provided by the publisher.

Isn’t It a Pity

13 rue Therese: A Novel by Elena Mauli Shapiro (Reagan Arthur Books; $23.99; 288 pages)

Initially this appears to be a beautifully presented novel based on the possessions of a woman who once lived in the early 1900s (experiencing both World Wars), in Paris.   The graphic reproductions of items owned by Louise Brunet, which came into the author’s possession as a young girl, are reproduced in a high-class manner.   Unfortunately, this story also contains some troubling characteristics which ruined the experience for this reader.

In the early 1980s, the author’s mother salvaged a small box of mementos formerly owned by Mrs. Brunet:  “This box is the sepulcher of Louise Brunet’s heart.   The story behind the objects is lost; the objects are now the story…  As I have carried this strange box through life and across the world, I have always intended to make a book out of it.   This book now exists; you hold it in your hands.”

It is a charming and promising premise – fleshing out an unknown life via the author’s imagination.   A great deal of the content involves the lives of French people, men and women, during World War I.   The read is initially quite engaging as we encounter an American historical researcher-professor, living in the present day, who comes across Mrs. Brunet’s possessions and begins – as he charts out the happenings of her life – to fall in love with her.   It will be an unrequited love except for the fact that through a miracle of time travel he comes to meet her face to face.   Having met Mrs. Brunet, the researcher is essentially freed to fall in love with a woman of his own time.

All of this has a Somewhere in Time or The Time Traveler’s Wife aspect to it, which seems wonderful on its face.   And yet, the Louise Brunet that the reader comes to identify with in the first half of the novel turns into a madwoman in its concluding portion.   This is a happily married woman – a woman who has never had a child – who engages in an affair with a married neighbor, knowing full well that it is wrong and that she takes the chance of getting pregnant; something that would destroy her marriage and world.

This female protagonist also engages in crimes and enjoys confessing her sins to a Catholic priest, to the point where she laughs hysterically after confessing her adultery.   It all seems strange and disjointed, as if the two halves of the novel do not fit together properly.   But this is not the biggest issue with the telling.

“She does not understand the power of that man’s body over her…  He is like a poison in her, all the more potent because she doesn’t want an antidote.   She welcomes this disease of desire.”

The major problem with 13 rue Therese is that the sex scenes are described in terms more than a bit reminiscent of Lady Chatterley’s Lover – rude, crude and shocking.   The polite language of an earlier time gives way to terms that appear to be deliberately intended to shock the once comfortable reader.   Perhaps this was done deliberately as an attempt to demonstrate the lack of control that overtakes Louise, a woman ready to destroy her life for a man she’s attracted to even while she does not understand that attraction.

In summary, 13 rue Therese is like one of those schizophrenic films (the movie version of Steve Martin’s Shopgirl comes to mind) that is quite pleasurable for the first hour, but hard to watch for the second.   This is a novel with great potential that simply self-destructs, and concludes in a rather mundane fashion.   It’s a pity.

Joseph Arellano

A review copy was provided by the publisher.   This novel was released today.