Author Archives: Eileen McGrath

May 17, 2013

Janice Sims. Escape with Me. Toronto: Harlequin Kimani, 2013.

escapeLana Corday has made a good living as a decorator in San Francisco but when her husband is accused of an enormous financial fraud, she is pursued by the media and her business dries up.  Both the media and the police badger Lana because he husband, Jeremy, is nowhere to be found.  Did Jeremy die when his yacht exploded, or did he fake his death so he could start a new life?

The FBI thinks that Jeremy is still alive and that he will come back for his beautiful wife.  Believing that Lana is the bait to catch Jeremy, the FBI enlists Lana’s father’s help. When she hears that her father has a touch of heart trouble, Lana returns to Hatteras Island to be by his side.  The FBI follows, in the person of handsome special agent Tennison Isles.  Jeremy’s deceptions have caused Lana to doubt her ability to judge people, but she can’t help but notice how her father trusts Tenn and enjoys his company.  Could she let herself fall for this upright, handsome, sexy man?

Janice Sims does a nice job of interweaving Lana and Tenn’s romance with the business of catching Jeremy, but what will set this book apart for North Carolina readers is the author’s familiarity with the Outer Banks–its geography, its beauty, its heritage.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2010-2019, 2013, Coast, Dare, Romance/Relationship, Sims, Janice

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May 15, 2013

Caleb Wygal. A Murder in Concord. Baltimore: PublishAmerica, 2009.

concordLucas Caine thought that he was lucky to get a job with Fitzgerald, Incorporated in Concord, North Carolina right out of college. The Fitzgeralds–Trent Simon Fitzgerald II, and his father, Trent, Sr.–pay very well and Lucas has been proud to work for such a successful company.  Lucas is the personal assistant to Trent II, who runs the company; he handles his boss’s schedule and media interactions. Lucas thinks he knows his boss well, but everything that Lucas thinks he knows is called into question when he finds his boss shot to death in the company parking lot.

The murderer was someone with access to the very secure Fitzgerald, Inc. corporate compound. The police initially see Lucas as their prime suspect, in part because Lucas was the last person known to see Trent alive but also because Trent and the rest of the Fitzgeralds are such upstanding members of the Concord community.  To clear his name, Lucas looks into the circumstances of his boss’s death–why the security system went out and how someone could enter the parking lot undetected–and conflict within the Fitzgerald family.  What Lucas finds upends his view of his boss and changes his own life.

 

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2009, Cabarrus, Mystery, Piedmont, Wygal, Caleb

May 9, 2013

Jill McCorkle. Life after Life. Chapel Hill: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 2013.

lifeA good family saga weaves together the stories of multiple generations of distinctly different but connected characters.  In Life after Life, the family is not the Forsytes, the Snopes, or the Corleones, but the residents and staff of Pine Haven, a retirement community in Fulton, North Carolina.  Pine Haven is the current home of a number of long-time Fulton residents including Lois Flowers, the local fashion plate; Marge Walker, the hyper-judgmental widow of a local judge; Stanley Stone, a retired attorney; and Sadie Randolph, who was widowed young and went on to become a beloved teacher.  But Pine Haven has attracted some outsiders too, including Toby Tyler, a retired teacher who drifted up from South Carolina and Rachel Silverman, a lawyer from Massachusetts (pronounced MassaTOOsetts by the locals) who choose Pine Haven for a very private reason.  People like Sadie are friendly with everyone, but Marge and Stanley (who is faking dementia) stir up some trouble.  Marge can be quite critical of C.J., the young woman who serves at the beautician for the residents.  C.J. is an easy target, with her piercings, tattoos, and her odd clothing.  And Marge doesn’t even know about how C.J. earned money before she had her baby, Kurt.

Joanna, the hospice worker, knows a bit about C.J’s life, but her heart is open to C.J. and her baby.  Joanna, a local who went away and then came back, has her own past which is a ready topic for Marge and Stanley when no better subject is at hand.  The intervention of a large dog saved her life and the dog’s wise owner helped Joanna find a way past her sadness to a meaningful life.

Joanna tends both the dying and the living–even Abby, a young girl who lives nearby and who is a regular visitor at Pine Haven.  Abby’s father is a childhood friend of Joanna’s and her mother is a mean, shallow person who every reader will root against.  The lives of Abby and her parents intersect with those of the Pine Haven characters in surprising ways.  This is a novel of revelations and unexpected connections.  Life after Life is a book in McCorkle’s characteristic style–there is sadness, humor, and wry acceptance of the muddle that people can make of their lives.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill catalog.

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Filed under 2010-2019, 2013, Coastal Plain, McCorkle, Jill

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May 3, 2013

Mary Flinn. A Forever Man. New York: Aviva Publishing, 2012.

foreverReaders met Chelsea Davenport and Kyle Davis as teenagers in Mary Flinn’s first book, The One.  The young couple married in Three Gifts and they are well settled in their marriage and their careers as A Forever Man opens.  As readers of the previous books know, Chelsea and Kyle are surrounded by family and friends, and the pair and those in their circle have faced a number of challenges and disappointments.

When the interior design expert in Kyle’s building company retires, Kyle and his partner Frank are delighted to hire Elise Masters, a talented twenty-something who was recently let go by a large Charlotte firm.  Since Kyle’s firm is so small, he and Elise often work together–meeting clients, assessing sites, and working nearby each other in the office.  Elise has a past that she is not eager to talk about, and a child who has special needs.  Kyle feels protective of Elise and her daughter, Lydia, but he feels something more too. Kyle’s feeling may be hidden, but friends and business associates can see that Elise is smitten with Kyle–Kyle is the “forever man” that Elise has been looking for.

Chelsea can sense that this new colleague poses a temptation for Kyle, and the situation is complicated by friends’ gossip, family crises, and the revelation that Lydia’s father is nearby.  Seeing how Kyle and Chelsea navigate this difficult situation will remind readers that “happily ever after”  is really “happy if we continue to work at it”–growing together, drawing strength from what has been, and keeping that passionate spark alive.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2010-2019, 2012, Flinn, Mary, Mountains, Romance/Relationship, Watauga

April 30, 2013

Shannon Greenland. The Summer My Life Began. New York: Speak, 2012.

summerElizabeth Margaret (“Em”) has her whole life in front of her–and every step of it has been mapped out by her high-achieving, status-seeking parents and maternal grandmother.   Advanced placement classes in high school, admission to Harvard, summer internships at dad’s law firm, a career in law or medicine.  Em and her sister Gwenny laugh at their parents’ pretensions but neither girl dares to jump off the path that their parents have charted for them.  But they do dream about it.

Em sees a chance to step off the treadmill for at least a few weeks when she receives an invitation to spend the summer with her Aunt Tilly on the Outer Banks.  The invitation unsettles Em’s mother and grandmother.   Aunt Tilly has never been mentioned by either woman.  After phone calls back and forth between Boston and the Outer Banks, a compromise is reached: Em can go south for a month, but she must come back to Boston to spend the second half of her summer vacation at the law firm.

Em doesn’t know what to expect, but she’s up for whatever it is. Or maybe not.  Aunt Tilly is as fun loving as her parents are uptight; the staff at the B&B that Aunt Tilly owns are like a family; Em gets a chance to practice her culinary skills; and there are not one but two handsome boys to hangout with.  But as Em spends time with her aunt and the B&B staff she learns how each got to this place, and not all the stories are happy ones.  Parents die, children are separated from their families, and not everyone who has a child is ready to be a parent.  This summer on the Outer Banks will change Em’s life forever.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2012, Children & Young Adults, Coast, Greenland, Shannon

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April 30, 2013

H. Leigh Aubrey. Never Say Never United States: H. Leigh Aubrey, 2011.

never

The most important man in Brian Marano’s life has always been his father.  Brian’s parents divorced when he was young and since then his father’s visits have been precious and few.  In high school Brian hopes that his athletic achievements will get his father’s attention.  They do get the attention of faculty, administrators, and other students at his Charlotte, North Carolina high school. Because he is a good athlete and a good kid, a teacher finds Brian a peer tutor to help him with the subjects that he struggles with.

That tutor is Jason Ratcliffe, a student from a well-to-do, socially prominent family.  Jason is a bit of a nerd, but well dressed and not unattractive.  Brian is uncomfortable being tutored in the opulent home in which Jason lives.  Jason is uncomfortable too, but for a different reason–he’s attracted to Brian and before long Brian is the most important man in his life.

Never Say Never follows Brian and Jason from high school, to college at UNC, to the early years of their careers.  Their friendship grows as they share the challenges of young adult life and as they come to terms, at different times and in different ways, with their love for each other.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2010-2019, 2011, Aubrey, H. Leigh, Mecklenburg, Orange, Piedmont, Romance/Relationship

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April 26, 2013

Corrine Jackson. If I Lie. New York: Simon Pulse, 2012.

lieWhen you’re in high school, things can seem very black-or-white. Girl cheats on her boyfriend who is a Marine on duty in Afghanistan, she’s trash. When that boyfriend is MIA after a firefight, the whole town shuns her and calls her ugly names.  Since this girl is the child of a woman who ran off with another man, even her own father treats her with a cold disdain. Like mother, like daughter.

This is Sophie Topper Quinn’s life. Quinn–the name her father insists on–has learned to accept her father’s cold manner. In the years since her mother left, Quinn has wondered what role she might have played in her mother’s departure. She can’t say that her father’s behavior is unreasonable, but she is shocked to find herself so on her own after a photo surfaces on Facebook that shows her kissing someone other than Carey Breen. No one knows that Quinn turned to someone else after Carey told her her that he was gay and asked her help in covering that for him in their small military town.

To keep Quinn out of trouble, her dad arranges for her to volunteer at the Veterans Administration Hospital in nearby Fayetteville.  There she becomes friends with George Wilkins, a retired military photographer.  George recognizes Quinn’s talent and enlists her to work with him on the Veterans History Project. Quinn’s edgy defensiveness does not put off George and as their friendship grows, he helps her navigate additional curve balls–like her mother’s return–that come her way.

Although If I Lie focuses on how Quinn responds the turmoil in her life, readers also get a look into the lives of other characters, particularly George, Quinn’s mother, and Carey’s best friend, Blake.  All have behaved in ways that they regret, without mercy or grace to themselves or those closest to them. By placing this coming-of-age novel in a military town in the Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell Era, Corrine Jackson has produced a book that will engage both young adult and mature readers.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2010-2019, 2012, Children & Young Adults, Coastal Plain, Cumberland, Jackson, Corrine, Onslow

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April 12, 2013

Tracy Crudup. The Mist of Mineral Springs. New York: iUniverse, 2004.

mist

Kennedy (Ken) Clarke isn’t someone to rush into marriage, but she’s no stranger to romance.  She’s a writer and when this book opens, she has just sold her first romance novel to a major New York publishing house.  She’s also about to marry the man who has won her heart, Garrett Langston.  It seems a match made in heaven, and their families and most of the small town of Madison, North Carolina will turn out for the wedding.

But two days before the wedding, Garrett is killed in a car accident. Kennedy, devastated, retreats to the beautiful cottage that Garrett built for them.  There she feels Garrett’s presence, hears his voice.  As time goes on, family and friends worry about Ken and the connection that she still feels to Garrett.  But that feeling comforts Ken and buoys her in the lonely hours while she writes. Garrett become a kind of guardian angel who will stay with her until she is ready to begin again with someone new.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2004, Crudup, Tracy, Piedmont, Rockingham, Romance/Relationship

April 5, 2013

Robert Heffner. Alma’s Prayer. Indianapolis, IN: Dog Ear Publishing, 2012.

alma Now that we’re in the sesquicentennial of the Civil War, we’re being treated to movies, websites, and articles about the politics and battles of that sad war.  But all wars have a home front, and the Civil War home front is the setting for Alma’s Prayer.  Alma is Alma Hawkins, a widow living the the mountains of western North Carolina.  Despite Alma’s pleas, her oldest son, Virgil, left their mountain farm to join the Confederate army. Virgil volunteered for a six month enlistment, but as the novel opens CSA President Jefferson Davis has just signed a new conscription act which calls all men eighteen and over into service and cancels all discharges.

Virgil’s letter telling his family that he’s not coming home reaches them shortly after his wife Jenny announces her pregnancy and Virgil’s brother, Luke, discovers the violence inflicted on a neighboring family whose husband deserted the army.  Luke’s concern for his mother and sister-in-law compels him to visit Virgil’s camp to ask him to come home.  Soon both brothers are on the run from the very posse who so brutally dealt with their neighbors.  This crisply-written novel covers some of the same literal and figurative territory as Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain.  It is a timely reminder that in wartime sacrifice, fear, cruelty, and bravery are not confined to the battlefield.

 

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2010-2019, 2012, Heffner, Robert, Mountains

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March 26, 2013

Karen E. Bender. A Town of Empty Rooms. Berkeley, CA: Counterpoint, 2013.

empty roomsWhen you grow up someplace, or live there for a very long time, you don’t notice the things like the weather, the food, the buildings, or the shared cultural expectations that make your  hometown distinctive.  But any of those can be jarring to an outsider.  That’s the case for Serena Hirsch and Dan Shine, a married couple who move with their two young children from New York City to the (fictitious) town of Waring, North Carolina.  Both Serena and Dan are deeply unsettled by the death of a close relative and by the inexplicable crime committed by Serena that precipitated their move from New York.

Dan, ever optimistic, believes that his new job in Waring will work out and that the family will eventually feel at home in the town.  To help his son Zeb fit in, Dan and Zeb join the Boys Scouts.  Dan is thrilled to become an assistant troop leader under the direction of his next-door neighbor, Forrest Sanders.  But Serena’s experience of Forrest is different from that of her husband, and her uneasiness about Forrest only deepens the chasm between her and Dan.

Serena hopes that she has found her place at Temple Shalom, the only Jewish synagogue in Waring.  In no time at all, she is working part-time at the synagogue and is on the board.  Her work with the temple strengthens her religious identification and gives her the resolve to push back against the Christian cultural hegemony that she and her children experience.  But all is not well at the temple, and Serena is buffed by conflicts within the congregation.

A Town of Empty Rooms is at its center a novel about the messages that we carry inside ourselves from our upbringings and the imperfect ways we struggle to make sense of our place in the world.  Setting Serena and Dan’s struggle in North Carolina allows long-time Tar Heels to consider their state anew.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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