Review: A Hundred Summers

Posted on by Pat
A Hundred Summers by Beatriz Williams
G.P Putnam’s Sons, 2013

Description (from amazon.com)

One of summer’s best beach reads, as named by People magazine, Vanity Fair, O: The Oprah Magazine and Good Housekeeping.

Memorial Day, 1938: New York socialite Lily Dane has just returned with her family to the idyllic oceanfront community of Seaview, Rhode Island, expecting another placid summer season among the familiar traditions and friendships that sustained her after heartbreak.

That is, until Greenwalds decide to take up residence in Seaview.

Nick and Budgie Greenwald are an unwelcome specter from Lily’s past: her former best friend and her former fiancé, now recently married—an event that set off a wildfire of gossip among the elite of Seaview, who have summered together for generations. Budgie’s arrival to restore her family’s old house puts her once more in the center of the community’s social scene, and she insinuates herself back into Lily’s friendship with an overpowering talent for seduction…and an alluring acquaintance from their college days, Yankees pitcher Graham Pendleton. But the ties that bind Lily to Nick are too strong and intricate to ignore, and the two are drawn back into long-buried dreams, despite their uneasy secrets and many emotional obligations.

Under the scorching summer sun, the unexpected truth of Budgie and Nick’s marriage bubbles to the surface, and as a cataclysmic hurricane barrels unseen up the Atlantic and into New England, Lily and Nick must confront an emotional cyclone of their own, which will change their worlds forever.

My Review (4 Stars: Liked it a lot!)

A Hundred Summers by Beatriz Williams is an interesting well paced romance novel.  I found it easy to read and very enjoyable.
It begins in October 1931 (not long after the stock market crash of 1929) and shifts back and forth between that time and about six and a half years later starting May 1938. It culminates with the devastating 1938 New England hurricane.
College students Lily Dane and Nick Greenwald fall in love.  Circumstances thwart their decision to marry.  Years separate them until they are back together for the summer on Rhode Island.  They begin to unravel the past lies and deceptions that have kept them apart.  Lily and Nick, along with two other characters, Budgie and Graham form a love square,  rather than a love triangle.
The author, Beatriz Williams‘ writing style, eloquently places the reader into this time period.  I thoroughly enjoyed A Hundred Summers.  If you are in the mood for a love story, this is a good one!

If you would like to read additional (varied) viewpoints, check out the following:

Published by Pat

Pat has been blogging on "Posting For Now" since 2013.  She writes mostly about the books she reads.  Occasionally, she will write about other topics.

5 thoughts on “Review: A Hundred Summers”

  4. Glad to see you enjoyed it. (And thanks for the link back.) I’m just not a romance reader and find a lot of the romance plots too predictable although I did enjoy the historical aspects and the alternate timeline. I was hoping for a little more history.

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