Summer Island

Author: Kristin Hannah

Brand: Audible

Format: Unabridged

Details: Amazon.com Review

Few authors dare to truly analyze the complex natures of mother-daughter relationships. In her novel Summer Island, author Kristin Hannah perfectly captures the bittersweet, inspiring, disappointing, tragic, and human aspects of such a relationship. Set in the tranquil, present-day San Juan Islands, Summer Island presents itself as a deep investigation of the ramifications of a mother's abandonment of her two daughters. Unlike many similar novels, this one delivers the goods.
When Nora Bridge left her husband and her two daughters 10 years ago, she took the only route she could see, and assumed she still had her daughters' love. Now, though she is distant from her own daughters, Nora is the hostess of a radio advice show, where she advises listeners that "family comes first." When a scandal breaks and Nora hits rock bottom, she finds she has to rely on the two people she has betrayed most deeply: her daughters, Ruby and Caroline.
As an aspiring and failing comedian, Ruby's life in Los Angeles has shrunk into a directionless morass. She says when she dismisses superstition, "As if she needed magic to tell her that she was stuck in the spin cycle of her life." Though neither she nor Caroline are inclined to help their mother, Ruby finally agrees when a magazine offers to pay her for a tell-all exposé.
With a masterful balance of cutting wit, realistic dialogue, and lyrical description, Summer Island is by far Hannah's greatest work. Mothers, daughters, and sisters are sure to mark the passages and lend this novel to each other. If this is the standard for future Hannah novels, her fan base is sure to grow.--Nancy R.E. O'Brien

Product Description

Thirty-four year old Ruby Bridge is a not-too-successful comedienne who uses her mother, a nationally-syndicated "moral and spiritual counselor" as the main fodder for her cynical, rather bitter humor. Her mother Nora, long divorced from Ruby's father, is a woman whose past is just about to catch up with her—in the form of blackmail by a former lover.

After an accident (an attempted suicide?) Ruby returns to care for her stricken mother—bitterly resenting the fact that once again her mother's life has colonized hers. When she is approached by a publisher to write a biography of her mother, Ruby is desperate for the princely sum offered. Yet her research into her mother's past reveals a woman very different from the one Ruby expected. And what began as "mommy dearest" ends as a love story—not only between mother and daughter, but involving two very different men who play a key role in linking the past to the present.


From Library Journal

When the unexpected career crisis of famed radio talk-show host Nora precipitates an automobile accident, she needs some long-term care. Ruby, her single and struggling comedienne daughter, very reluctantly agrees to come to her mother's aid. Unsurprisingly, their strained relationship begins to undergo subtle changes, and they shyly become reacquainted. Slowly, the two women begin to look at the past together, with new insight, understanding, and, eventually, forgiveness. Not content just to explore this story line, Hannah (Angel Falls) adds a long-buried but not forgotten romance, a dying AIDS patient, a sister's failing marriage, and a father's remarriage to the already turbulent mix of emotions affecting the two women. Hannah's strength lies in giving readers a warm and touching story about very human characters whose personal situations come to life with realism and sensitivity. Reminiscent of recent fiction by Luanne Rice or Barbara Bretton, this novel would be a good purchase for any public library boasting a growing collection of women's fiction. Margaret Hanes, Sterling Heights P.L., MI
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From the Back Cover

"Hannah is superb at delving into the characters' psyches and delineating nuances of feeling."
-- Washington Post Book World

From Booklist

When Ruby was 16, her mother,

Release Date: 21-10-2008

Languages: English

Binding: Audible Audiobook