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Summary
Summary
Lindsay and Kerrie Ann are sisters who have known hardship from an early age. Without guidance from their neglectful mother, their only aid came from an unlikely source, a retired exotic dancer by the name of Miss Honi Love. When the girls' mother was sent to prison, Miss Honi tried unsuccessfully to save them from being separated and sent into foster care.
Thirty years later, Lindsay is still trying to reconnect with her sister. The owner of a bookstore in the sleepy California seaside town of Blue Moon Bay, she was lucky enough to have been adopted by a loving couple. Unbeknownst to her, Kerrie Ann has suffered a very different life. Bounced from one foster home to the next, she ran away as a teenager before becoming a drug-addicted single mother. Now, newly sober, Kerrie Ann is fighting to regain custody of the little girl who was taken fromher.
Neither sister's expectations are met when they're finally reunited. But as the two sisters engage in the fiercest battles of their lives, they are at last drawn together despite their differences, restoring belief in the unshakable bond of family.
Author Notes
Eileen Goudge was born July 4, 1950 and grew up in the San Francisco bay area. She began writing at the age of eight. At eighteen, she dropped out of college, ran off with a man dodging the draft, and got married. Two years later, she was divorced, with a baby, and had to go on welfare. She decided to become a professional writer, started writing non-stop and managed to sell a few articles. In the early eighties, she was chosen to help launch a new line of teen romances, which became the successful Sweet Valley High series. She now had enough money to end another bad marriage and move to New York City with her two children. She continued to write the Sweet Valley High titles while working on a novel. Her first novel, Garden of Lies, was sold in 1986 to Viking for nearly one million dollars. Since then, she has written over thirty novels for young adults and over ten works of women's fiction. Her other works include Thorns of Truth, The Diary, and Once in a Blue Moon. Her title The Diary is a New York Times bestseller.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
As children, sisters Lindsay and Kerri Ann are shunted into the foster care system after their mother is arrested for selling drugs in Goudge's (The Diary) charming newest. Lindsay is fortunate enough to be adopted by a loving family, while younger Kerri Ann bounces from family to family, becoming a teenage runaway, getting into drugs and eventually losing custody of her own daughter. Thirty years after they last saw each other, Kerri Ann shows up on Lindsay's doorstep in a last ditch effort to save herself. Lindsay, of course, has troubles of her own, and her nearly unrecognizable sister turning up is the last thing she needs. The tension in the sisters' relationship is believable, and while romantic subplots are completely predictable, family dynamics are beautifully handled, particularly between the girls and the woman who tried to save them from foster care, stripper Miss Honi. A touching story with wide appeal, Goudge's novel is a sharp example of dysfunctional family fiction. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
Two sisters, one a marginally successful bookstore owner, the other a recovering drug addict, reunite after 30 years. Problems ensue. Good girl Lindsay is desultorily involved with a handsome lawyer boyfriend who's as comfortable as a cardigan sweaterand about as exciting. The slick and evil Heywood Group wants to tear Lindsay from her home overlooking the Pacific and build a resort. In an attempt to boost sales at her bookstore, she arranges for bestselling author Randall Craig to do a signing, but he doesn't show. A bit later, he appears, apologizes, invites Lindsay out to dinner and eventually reawakens her slumbering eroticism. Randall isn't as perfect as he appears, however, for he's hiding a family secret. Meanwhile, bad girl Kerrie Ann, Lindsay's long-lost sister, turns up with problems of her own: a fight against addiction, a six-year-old daughter in foster care, a failed relationship with a fellow junkie and no job skills. Lindsay hires her sister, a high-school dropout who doesn't know Judy Blume from Harold Bloom, and Kerrie Ann quickly draws the attention of bad-boy-turned-good Ollie, coffee maker and baker extraordinaire. Much of the narrative concerns Lindsay's efforts to domesticate her occasionally sluttish sister and Kerrie Ann's attempt to gain custody of her daughter, now in the capable and loving hands of a successful dentist and his wife who do not want to give the child up. Eighty-year-old former stripper Honi Love, a family friend, provides folk wisdom and comic relief. Is redemption possible for Kerrie Ann? Will the good guys win? Will Randall earn Lindsay's love? Let's just say the plot is as predictable as the prose is flat. One thing you can say about Goudge (The Diary, 2009, etc.): She knows the bestseller formula and sticks to it. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Goudge, author of Immediate Family (2006), Woman in Red (2007), The Diary (2009), and other popular romances, uses a well-worn plot device in telling the story of sisters cast adrift in the foster care system after their mother is arrested for drug possession. Twenty-seven years later they are reunited, only to struggle with a multitude of problems. Lindsay's beloved home on the northern California coast is the target of a real estate developer; drug-addicted Kerrie Anne, having lost custody of her daughter, is trying to kick her habit and recover her little Bella from the foster care system. The plot, predictable from sad start to happy ending, moves swiftly, propelled by recurrent crises in the sisters' tangled lives. Characters are comfortable types with just enough tweaking to evoke reader interest. Romances, both old and new, abound. Fans of Goudge's previous books, romance readers, and lovers of family sagas will enjoy the plot, characters, and resolution. Public libraries with a romance readership will want to add this book to a high-circulation area of the collection.--Loughran, Ellen Copyright 2009 Booklist
