Surprise Me: A Novel by Sophie Kinsella

Surprise Me: A Novel.  Sophie Kinsella. Random House Publishing Group. February 2018. 432 pp.  ISBN#: 9780399592881.

Sylvia and Dan have been married for ten years; they truly are best friends who completely understand each other and their rambunctious twin daughters.  One day they visit a doctor for a wellness visit and from here to about three-quarters of the way through the novel the plot gets downright silly.  They are healthy and are told by the doctor that they have another sixty-eight years more of life together.  For some odd reason, this scares the heck out of Sylvia and Dan.  While their uncanny understanding of each other’s thoughts and feelings brings great peace and joy to their life, the unpredictability of it is unacceptable.  So, they come up with a plan of surprises to keep the future fresh and novel, but it doesn’t really work out at all.

Meanwhile the only thin friction between them has to do with Dan’s dislike of Sylvia’s privileged past and his refusal to let her “Daddy” finance their future.  However, it will turn out that Daddy wasn’t the perfect husband and parent in Sylvia’s memories and this part of the plot saves this novel from being a disaster.  Dan is more than just an understanding husband and lover.  He’s someone who’s been trying to save his wife’s perfect image of her father, sheltering her from the stark reality of a very flawed father.  The ending is quite a shocker for Sylvia but what is more precious is the fact there are some secrets in Dan that are stunning elements and a definite surprise! 

While the second half of this novel “saves the day,” overall, it’s a bit of a strain on credibility.  However, Kinsella manages to pull the reader into an interesting and real part of the relationships that work.  Nicely done, to a degree!

Ocean Beach: A Novel by Wendy Wax

Ocean Beach: A Novel. Wendy Wax. Berkley Trade Paperback. June 26, 2012. 448 pages. ISBN #: 9780425245415.

Madeline, Avery, Nicole, Deirdre, and Chase are back from their stint in the novel, Ten Beach Road, with some kinks solved and some still lurking as they embark on another "Do-Over" of a dilapidated home that is an architectural treasure!  But you wouldn't know it to read the descriptions of what these fearful but also feisty characters see, hear, smell, and touch on their first exploration of their latest project in South Miami, Florida.  Here's the difference - they are now part of a TV program in which their redo job is to be followed like a reality show.  But don't realize that all of their lives are to be included this "reality" show.  That's their first major shock!

This is the home of Max, a former comedian, who has recently lost Millie, the love of his life.  He's still got plenty of pizazz but it's laced with lack of energy and admission of total lack of skills to keep this gorgeous "nautical" home in the prime condition it deserves.  Now a bit of zest comes back into his life as he enjoys the presence of these diverse ladies and of course Baby Dustin.  

All is not bliss.  There's a serious lack of money for this project that not even the TV pay can help.  Then there are the personal problems plaguing their daily progress.  Maddie's husband wants her to stay home and be the homemaker while he "earns the bread;" Avery and Deirdre are still on rocky road territory with the latter wanting to make up for years of no mothering and the former not buying the efforts one bit.  Nicole wants to resurrect her matchmaking business, ruined by her reputation as the wife of a Ponzi-scheming criminal.  Avery and Chase are a hot number now but there are some issues there as well.  At first one might think this is just a rehash of the last novel, but it's NOT so!  For there are secrets lurking that turn this summer (all-year round really) read into a romantic mystery that's even more thrilling than the last novel.

Max and Millie lived with a heart-breaking secret that just might fit into the "do-over" plans with some help from other new characters in this terrific story.  The cameramen learn to be a bit wiser about what they film and don't film after some nasty and also funny scenes. To tell more would be a spoiler that would deprive you of hours of pleasure!

Ocean Beach: A Novel is plainly and imply a great and must read!!!  Wendy Wax is one very talented writer who knows how to craft a great story with complex characters, a great plot, and plug in just enough steamy romance to satisfy everyone.  Finely done!!!

The Queen's Vow: A Novel of Isabella of Castile by C. W. Gortner

The Queen's Vow: A Novel of Isabella of Castile. C. W. Gortner. Random House Publishing Group.  June 2012.  400 pp. ISBN #: 978034552396.

Isabella's initial exposure to politics comes just before the demise of her father, a man who will die from grief after his closest adviser is murdered.  At least that is what Isabella's furious mother believes.  Standing by her father's deathbed, Isabella is startled to recognize the look of greed on her half-brother Enrique's face, a look that clearly presages the kind of King he will become.  For The Queens's Vow is about Isabella's newly found fortitude which will be sorely tested first by her brother, advised by the evil Marquis of Villena, and then as the novel progresses by numerous other so-called "advisers."  Sometimes readers may forget that Kings and Queens are human beings with strengths and fragile aspects of personality that shape history for years, if not centuries.  We are reminded in this fiction account that women were not expected to be successful rulers, being deemed less possessed of intelligence, capabilities, and skills necessary to accomplish such a daunting task.  Isabella is presented as a woman ready to rule wisely and fairly, a woman who learns from her own mistakes.

Before that comes to pass, however, King Enrique seems incapable of fathering an heir while his wife manages to conceive a beautiful girl, much to the delight of court and public gossipers. That wouldn't matter much to Isabella except that the Queen insists her daughter is the heir to the throne and does everything in her power to guarantee that neither Alfonso (Isabella's other brother) nor Isabella will ever rule Castile.   Queen Juana's road to perdition makes for tense and riveting reading, supplemented by the increasing notorious influence of the King's own lover. 

Isabella's world dramatically alters after she meets Prince Ferdinand of Aragon; they are magnetically connected immediately with a tenderness and passion totally unexpected in the swirls of Court dissension and machinations.  Their brief meeting marks the beginning of an eventual marriage of mind and heart that will have its highs and lows but more notably will be marked by the manner in which they treat each other, with respect and equality hardly seen in that particular country or century.  Their union continues with the rise of military conflicts and the Church's insistence that an Inquisition be conducted to root out Jewish conversos heretics (and more as Isabella suspects) that is earning Spain divine disfavor.  These are just a few of the contentious problems that the couple must deal with as they begin to raise a family and gird Spain for prosperity in years to come!

The Queen's Vow is finely researched and even more finely written!  We come to know Isabella intimately in mind, heart, and body as she lives through a tumultuous time, her intense longing to be the determiner of her own unique destiny!  Many have been Queens but few manifest the regal qualities that truly define female leaders like this magnificent "Majestad."  Phenomenal accomplishment, C. W. Gortner - this novel deserves the highest acclaim!