A Summer For Witches

 

    The book opens with 24 year old Janet's telephone ringing. When she answers it she immediately recognizes the voice as that of Floncy, a girl from her past who had disappeared without a trace 15 years ago.

    When Janet was 9 years old her single mother had taken on a job as a housekeeper at Shorecrest, the impressive summer home of actress Evelyn Gilmor. There Janet has an amazing summer living in the little cottage on the grounds, enjoying days playing with Evelyn's kind hearted 17 year-old daughter Floncy and 13 year-old son Scott whom Janet has a crush on. The house is constantly being visited by famous friends, parties are always happenings, and romance is in the air as lovesick psychiatrist Dr. Bronson is at Evelyn's beck and call.

    When summer ends Janet's mother stay on working for Evelyn in her city residence. Scott and Floncy are away at school and Janet eagerly awaits the next summer when they will all be at Shorecrest again.

    However when the summer arrives it lacks the charm and magic of the last year. Floncy has taken a part in a local play and fallen in love with an actor named Todd Van Dyke. Evelyn does not approve of either of these things and makes Floncy give up the stage and Todd.

    This causes constant fighting between Floncey and her mother and often Janet comes across Floncy sobbing alone on the beach.

    One August morning Floncy is no where to be found and when a search of the house and grounds proves fruitless the authorities are called in but the case goes unsolved. After years of no sign of Floncy she is declared legally dead.

    Yet here she is on the phone insisting that Janet come to Shorecrest right away, and to come alone.

    Janet borrows a car from her perpetually friendzoned date, Dave, and starts the 3 hour long drive on a stormy winter evening. She finds the timing of this happening strangely coincidental as she had reason to think of her summers at Shorecrest twice recently. The first time when she had seen a woman that resembled Evelyn stepping out of a dr. Bronsons private hospital in the city. And the second when her mother, who recently got married, sent her a box of her childhood things, including a book she had borrowed from Shorecrest and never returned. However she put it in the mail to return it right away.

    Once at the house she is greeted (and I use the term loosely) by Ida, one of the maids that Janet's mom worked with, and Scott. Neither whom are happy to see her. Evelyn, Scott says, is very ill and can not be excited with claims that Floncy is alive and making phone calls.

    Janet is granted an audience with Evelyn who appears weak and looks ill but retains her former charm. When Janet says she will be leaving soon Evelyn insists she stay for the night in the little cottage on the grounds.

    Reluctantly Janet accepts. She would rather have stayed at a motel as Shorecrest no longer has the charm it once had. It's gloomy and subdued, even the art had been stripped from the walls. 

    Despite her discomfort Janet sleeps well as she is tired from the drive and emotional strain of the day. In the morning she dresses and is ready to leave right away but as she steps out of the cottage she finds a man's dead body on the porch, with a knife in his back. 

    She runs screaming into the main house where she finds Scott. He calls the police and after a long wait alone in the library the sheriff comes in to question her. 

    He informs her the man is Judson Brock, a former groundskeeper Janet remembers from her childhood summers. Ida and her sister Carrie have wasted no time in telling the sheriff that Jud and Janet's mother had had a romantic relationship one summer and with that information the sheriff starts piecing together a fictional story of Janet killing Jud. Suggesting the man was threatening to tell Janet's new step father about the romance unless he's paid off leading to Janet killing him. He supports his theory with the fact the knife was taken from the cottage kitchen. 

    Although not under arrest, Janet is told to stay in the vicinity until the state police arrive to investigate. Distraught Janet goes for a walk on the beach and up a cliff that use to be one of Floncy's special places. Sitting on the edge of the rocky cliff Janet feels a hand against her back pushing her over the edge. She manages to hang on and pull herself back up but she is badly shaken and runs back to the house, and into the arms of Scott who her childhood crush on has been revived. Alone together that night he kisses her and Janet wonders if she's secretly loved him all these years. However the moment is ruined when he admits he doesn't believe Janet's story of being pushed off the cliff. 

    When Janet heads for church service the next morning Scott joins her and afterwards they go for a long drive, stopping at a little restaurant for lunch. After this Janet is sure she is in love with Scott. On the drive back to the house Janet notices a man working at a shooting booth on the board walk but it's not until she's back in her room that she realizes the man is Todd Van Dyke. 

    Sure that he must know where Floncy is she sneaks out of the house to go talk to him but outside she runs into Dave who has read about the incident in the paper and has come to help Janet as a lawyer and a friend (and a simp).

    Together they go to town and ask where Todd lives then head to his house which is really a one room shack. Todd, who had plans of going to Hollywood to become a famous actor, has remained in the small seaside town for 15 years, still in love with Floncy, and determined to learn what happened to her. 

    He tells Janet that he has surveilled Shorecrest for the last 15 years, keeping track of the family's coming and goings, and breaking into the house when it's closed for the winter to look through it for any information that could explain Floncy's disappearance.

    It's through these break-ins that he found Floncy's deceased fathers will in which he left all his money in a trust fund for Floncy and left Scott nothing. Todd and Floncy were planning to elope days after her disappearance with Scott being the only one she told.

    Because of this Todd believes Scott killed her. This theory is backed up by Scott having her declared legally dead which caused him to recieve her inheritance.

    Janet refuses to believe Scott could be involved and despite Dave's instance she wont tell the sheriff this information. 

    On the drive back to Shorecrest Janet says she want to see her mother as she would have a better understanding of the happenings of Shorecrest 15 years ago than 9 year old Janet did. Dave gets permission from the sheriff for him and Janet to make the 3 hour trip to see her mother the next day. Her mother tells them she had heard from Jud over the years as he kept pursuing her and that she suspected he was blackmailing people as he had suddenly acquired a lot of money. But besides that she has no new information for them besides reminiscing over the grand summers at Shorecrest.

    When Dave drops Janet back off at the house that night he tells her that not informing the police about Scott is obstruction of justice and he wont be able to represent her legally. Janet still insists on not telling the sheriff. Dave says in that case he will have to return to the city that night but if she changes her mind he will still be at his motel until 9.

    Back inside her room Janet is thinking over what her mother said when suddenly it all becomes clear. She knows what happened to Floncy, who did it and why, and that her life is in danger.

    She sneaks to the kitchen and calls Dave, arranging to have him meet her at an intersection, then goes outside where she sees a man and women in a car pulling out of the garage but cant see their faces.  

    Once with Dave she explains everything to him (but not to us). A car appears to be following them but Janet doesnt care, she just wants to get to a destination in the city; the private hospital owned by Dr. Bronson. Once there the car following them is revealed to be Todd. Together the three of them force their way inside and demand to see Floncy. Evelyn appears trying to play innocent but Dr. Bronson knows the jig is up. Floncy is brought in, vacant looking from years of sedation. Todd tenderly wraps her in his arms, his unending devotion rewarded.

    It's revealed that 15 years ago Scott, upon learning of Floncy's upcoming elopement, had told his mother, and she, together with Dr. Bronson, Jud, Ida, and Carrie, had put Floncy in Bronson's hospital, gaslighting her that she was severely mentally ill. Meanwhile they pretended she had disappeared so as to have her declared dead and Scott receive her inheritance so he could give it to his mother who is a compulsive spender. This had worked successfully for them until Janet saw Evelyn leaving the hospital one day. The woman Janet thought "looked like" Evelyn was in fact her and she was convinced Janet recognized her a such. When Janet then mailed the book to her soon after she believed this to be some kind of threat that implied Janet knew what was going on. 

    Impersonating Floncy she lured Janet to the Shorecrest so she could kill Jud, who was blackmailing her, and have it pinned on Janet, thus killing two birds with one stone. She then tried to push Janet off the cliff with the plan of it appearing as a suicide. 

    With the truth revealed Floncy is taken to a hospital to recuperate, the guilty parties are arrested, Janet realizes her feelings for Scott were simply childhood memories, and to Dave's great happiness she realizes it's he she loves.

- I read it in one reading because it was too hard to put down. It was very suspenseful and I just had to find out what happened to Floncy.

- The backstory is woven into the whole book really wonderfully and skillfully.

Love is Blind

    Gorgeous twenty-one year old Cass Everett has just moved from Philadelphia to San Francisco to take on a job as a secretary in an x-ray lab. Having not been there long she already has a serious crush on one of the radiology doctors, Bill Atkinson, and fortunately for Cass, the feeling is mutual.

    The two begin going out on dates, especially to the race track as Bill is a big fan of racing and soon they are confessing their deep love and mentions of marriage. On the way home from one of their dates it begins to rain and the car skids and flips over. The two are fine with the exception of a deep cut in Cass' cheek. With a scar most likely to result Cass' Aunt Willa hires Dr. Tod Jeffers to do a skin graft on it. Tod is one of the top plastic surgeons on the west coast and to Cass's surprise he is close to her age. 

    With the plastic surgery scheduled for a few weeks away Cass goes back to work. A new hire named Linda soon joins the lab's team and it's clear to all the women that she has only taken on the job to try and land a rich, doctor husband. She acts cold towards the women and turns the charm on when any men are around. 

    Against her will Cass begins to worry about Bill and if he will fall prey to Linda. Despite never having been self conscious in the past Cass realizes her facial injury and the chance of a disfiguring scar are making her loose her confidence. However Cass feels a bit better when Dr. Jeffers visits the lab and Linda appears to lock onto him as her target. This belief is reinforced when Linda asks to visit Cass in the hospital after she's had the surgery.

    The surgery itself is successful but the following days of recovery are a struggle for Cass. All she wants is to see Bill but when he arrives he has Linda with him and Cass doesn't get to see him alone. That night she comes down with a terrible cold which will keep her in the hospital longer. Her next two visits from Bill are also intruded on by Linda and when a co-worker visits Cass she says Bill and Linda have been inseparable at work. 

    That evening Dr. Jeffers comes into Cass's room while she is bawling her eyes out. He washes her face and lets her tell him of her troubles. Cass is surprised by how easy she finds it to confide in him.

    The next day when Bill and Linda visit Tod comes into the room and begins to flirt with Linda before inviting her out for a drink, a ploy to give Cass and Bill some time alone. After she leaves with the surgeon Bill becomes upset and agitated about it. Cass confronts him bluntly; "Bill, you're in love with Linda, aren't you?".  Bill mistakes her tone and sees the accusation as a sympathetic remark. Suddenly he is telling Cass how happy he is that she understands, that clearly Cass and him are just two friends who mistook their friendship for something more. Cass, holding onto her pride, plays along and tells Bill she also had been wanting to end their relationship for awhile.

    Cass is surprised to find she doesn't feel emotionally shattered over the break up but she does feel depressed. Once home from the hospital Cass is annoyed to receive a call from Bill asking if she has heard from either Tod Jeffers or Linda. Linda has apparently thrown Bill to the side in favor of the doctor. Cass is greatly annoyed by Bill's immaturity in calling and after recalling numerous things he had said and done in the past Cass realizes Bill is very much a "man-child".

    "The person she thought Bill to be, a man she could love, had never really existed except in her own starry-eyed concept of him. So her mistake had been an error of judgment about the man, not about her feelings for him, and when she saw the man was nonexistent, her feelings became nonexistent, too."

    Back at work, and in the presence of Bill, Cass finds she truly does have no feelings for him but for some reason she still gets an upsetting feeling when Linda is around. She finds herself thinking about how much Linda is seeing Tod and wonders if he really has fallen for Linda's calculated charm. This she finds is more painful than the thought of Bill and Linda together was.

    At her follow-up appointment with Tod she finds herself in an argumentative mood over these feelings which brings out one in him as well. He's been going out with Linda to try and keep her away from Bill so Cass could have Bill and be happy...despite Tod being in love with Cass himself. This truth comes out in a yelling argument and soon Cass also confesses her love for Tod. 

- Much like one of the other books I've read by Marcia Miller this book has a woman named Cass with a scarred cheek from a car accident. It is also set in San Francisco with a home on telegraph hill, and it's filled with the detailed descriptions of the main characters clothing and home decorating. I can't find any information on Marcia Miller but I wish I could. Clearly she loved fashion and interior decorating and the repeated use of the cheek scar makes me wonder if it's something she pulled from personal experience. 

- Cass lives in a two-story apartment building yet it says she takes an elevator down from her apartment. I think Marcia Miller forgot what she had written.

- Although it mentions Cass' cheek healing there is no mention of the area behind her ear, where the skin was taken from for the skin graft, healing. 

- The end was kind of abrupt.

Safe Harbor

    Sheila Dexter is in her third year of nurse training. She's just been moved from the Children's Ward to the Geriatric Ward where she works under Dr. Anton Mathews, the handsome new doctor that has just moved to town with his 6 year old son. Many believe the widower will be looking to remarry to give his child a mother and every woman at the hospital hopes she will become the next Mrs. Mathews. One woman in particular is Nurse Majors, who is head nurse of the Geriatric Ward and has become obsessed with Dr. Mathews despite him showing no interest in her. 

    When Sheila begins working there Nurse Majors instantly sees the young redhead as a threat and becomes quite harsh towards her. Taking any chance to correct her and gossip to Dr. Mathews about Sheila supposed boyfriends.

    Sheila is scheduled to work on Christmas day and as she approaches the hospital she sees a sad little boy out front. In an attempt to cheer him up Sheila takes him to see the hospital Christmas tree and gives him a bar of chocolate as a gift before finding out he is Peter Mathews, Dr. Mathew's son. Anton is pleased to find out about Sheila's kind treatment to the boy and surprised by Peter's instant fondness of Sheila.

    When Sheila has a day off she goes into town to shop and runs into Anton and Peter. At the child's insistence Sheila joins them on an outing to the park, lunch at a teashop, then back to their house so Peter can show Sheila his Christmas presents. 

    Despite Peter insisting he wants Sheila to visit them again Anton does not invite her as he worries about a relationship between the two. Both because of Nurse Majors insistence that Sheila is in a relationship with both a student doctor at the hospital and an airman (who is actually her brother) and because of the 10 year age gap between them.

    Soon rumor begins circulating around the hospital of Sheila's day off being spent with Dr. Mathews. Infuriated Nurse Majors claims Sheila is not suitable for the Geriatric Ward and has her moved to Men's Surgery Ward, away from Anton.

    After taking her final exams Sheila's brother Sam pays a visit and takes her out for a celebratory dinner. Sheila suggests they go to the tearoom she went with Peter and Anton. While there Peter and his nanny come in and they share a table. Peter and Sam hit it off with Peter deciding he wants to be an airman too when he grows up. 

    Peter drives them home and when Anton sees Sam he becomes cold, thinking this is the man Nurse Majors had told him about. But when Sheila introduces him as her brother Anton becomes friendly and realizes he must really have fallen for Sheila if he's acting so foolish. Again Peter insists Sheila will have to come visit him again but this still does not happen as Anton becomes distant from her at the hospital.

    Just as Sheila starts thinking about making the next move and calling Anton, he calls her. Peter is missing and he wants to know if Sheila has heard from or seen the boy. Worried Sheila has Anton come pick her up to search for Peter and she suggests going to the park where they find him. Peter is mad because Sheila has not come to visit him and Anton confesses it's his fault. They take the boy home and put him to bed then confess their love for each other before embracing. 

    This book is "A Romantic Novelette" which was a series put out by Globe Publishing Corps as part of their Mini Mag line. Mini Mags were little booklets you would pick up in the checkout line of grocery stores and, to my understanding, were attempting to compete with Dell Publishing's line of "Purse Books". Purse Books were typically made up of articles from magazines published by Dell. I'm not sure if the same is true for Globe Mini Mags but titles such as "Lose Weight While You Sleep" and "Bible Heeling Foods" keep me uninterested in finding out.

    However I was intrigued when I saw these Novelettes. They're just under 100 pages making them very quick reads. I think I've mentioned before how I prefer books I can read quickly. I'm a "I got to know what happens" type of person when it comes to books so I hate having to set them down and prefer ones I can read in one sitting. Clearly these are perfect for that.

    Safe Harbor is listed as book #213 and inside the back cover lists Novelette books #180 - #191 however I'm not sure if that means there are that many novelettes or if that is just the publishing number of everything in the Mini Mag line and books #001 - #179 are their usual "How to Read Your Cats Mind" type stuff. I'll have to do more research on it.

    Anyways, on to the actual book review. I didn't know what to expect from this. The back cover says "As Sheila and Anton discovered, you have to be willing to gamble when you play the game of love!".

    "Gamble"..."play the game"... this made me think the book took place in a casino, maybe Monte Carlo, Vegas, Atlantic City even. So it certainly was a surprise to find it's set in a British hospital. Despite being disappointed I tried to give it a fair go.

    It wasn't as bad as I thought it'd be. I wasn't much of a fan of the drama with the hospital patients and more liked the stuff with Sheila and Anton, Peter, Sam, her friend Molly, etc. Like most romance books I found myself annoyed with the lack of communication between the characters. A lot of romance plots are fueled by keeping the characters from talking or discussing things with each other for absolutely no reason other than the storyline needs to keep going for another 50 - 100 pages. I think it's a huge mark of poor writing but to be fair I wasn't expecting a 49 cent grocery store romance book to be on par with Jane Austin. With that in mind, it's not bad.

Spotlight on Romance

    Nan has just taken a new job at AAC, a prestigious publicity firm in Hollywood. Her first day on the job she is warned by Rhoda, her co-worker, to watch out for their boss, Helene. According to Rhoda, Helene is an extremely jealous person who will stop at nothing to destroy the career of any woman she feels intimidated by. This worries Nan until she meets Helene and finds her to be very kind and charming. Nan assumes Rhoda must be paranoid or have a persecution complex.

    Nan is told she will start her new job by observing her coworkers and then slowly become more hands on. However when she finds herself in an elevator with Olin Gray, a prestigious British actor, she is able to talk him into making an appearance on a talk show. This is considered a huge get and Nan is praised by Arthur, the head of the company. 

    While in Helene's office Nan is introduced to Judd Carter, a popular novelist that Helene appears to have a crush on. Although Nan dislikes the man after their first meeting she warms to him and he begins taking her out on dates.

    Nans first few assignments end up being disasters; a Broadway actor storms out of a talk show appearance when he learns the other guest is an animal tamer, and a teetotaler politician storms out of a restaurant when a cocktail is brought to his table. Nan knows she cant mess up another assignment so when she is told to handle publicity for an upcoming book signing she thinks up an idea to have a photographer present and offer free fan photos with the author. This is a huge success but when she begins to receive praise for her idea from Arthur, Helene intervenes claiming it was her idea and acts shocked by Nans so-called deceit. 

    Nan assumes it was simply a misunderstanding and continues to try and make good at the company. However she once again ends up with a disastrous assignment when an egotistical young actor tries to force himself on her because, he says, Helene told him Nan was "crazy about him".

    Despite becoming suspicious of Helene, Nan still wants to believe in her innocence. When Helene calls Nan into her office and tells Nan about her top-secret new assignment, Olin Gray appearing at the opening of a department store, Nan is concerned but goes ahead with it.

    When Olin Gray happens to stop by her office and Nan shows him the advertisements he is angry, thinking Nan is taking advantage of his previous generosity. Arthur is called into Nan's office who yells at her for "her stupidity" and when Nan insists it was assigned to her by Helene, Helene is also called in. Helene feigns innocents and Nan is fired in a verbal onslaught. At first Nan is willing to give up her job without a fight but, realizing it will leave a mark on her career that she might not be able to overcome, she fiercely defends herself, telling Arthur to look up the turn over rate under Helene. Back in his office he does this and comes to the realization that Nan is telling the truth. Arthur, Judd, and Nan confront Helene who more or less admits to it when it comes out that she got her job position by blackmailing the former head of the company whom she was having an affair with. 

    She quits before she can be fired and her position is given to the much deserving Rhoda while Nan and Judd acknowledge their love for one another.

Bright Tomorrow

    Sisters Cass and Lisa are orphaned at a young age when their parents pass from a car wreck. Cass, who was in the car with her parents, miraculously survives the accident but it leaves her with a disfiguring scar across her cheek. When taken in by their Aunt Edith the beautiful Lisa is spoiled while traumatized and disfigured Cass is left to emotionally and socially fend for herself resulting in a lonely and isolated life. 

    Fortunately for Cass her parents old friend Monica is visiting from England and stops by to see the girls. She is upset to see that eighteen year old Cass still has the scar and that Edith has not allowed for the simple plastic surgery to remove it. After seeing how horrifically shy and withdrawn Cass is and the significant difference in the treatment the sisters receive, Monica asks Cass to return to London with her where she will get Cass the surgery she needs as well as the parental kindness and love. 

    The surgery is a success and for the next two years Cass engages in a happy and fulfilling life under the guidance of Monica. She makes friendships, dates, and when the extra time stacks up she begins a career in copywriting despite inheriting enough money from her parents to live comfortably.

    When she learns a new department store, Gratons, is opening in her former hometown San Francisco she secures a job there as a copy writer and heads back to the states, with Monica's warning not to let her reunion with Lisa and Edith destroy her new found self confidence. 

    Once back home she visits with Lisa and Edith, with neither of them in a rush to see her, and finds their demeanors strange. Cass's confidence in her self, both inside and out, have turned her into a gorgeous woman and her aunt and sister now seem to see her as competition to Lisa socially, and romantically.

    Lisa and Edith inform Cass that Lisa is in a serious relationship with Brad Kincad, the owners son of Gratons but make excuses to keep Cass from meeting him. She does end up meeting him and he invites her out to dinner where he insists Lisa and him are just casual acquaintances. 

    Edith sees them out together and storms over to Cass' apartment the next day where she tells her to stay away from Brad. However Lisa calls up that evening saying that Brad was telling the truth, they're just friends and any romantic feelings between them was simply wishful thinking on her part. She encourages Cass to date Brad if it makes her happy. Cass is touched by this and happy to think her and Lisa are becoming close for the first time in their lives.

    Brad continues to take Cass on dates and is clearly smitten with her. One day his mother makes an appearance in her office and says she wanted to meet Cass after hearing Brad speak so much of her. However there seems to be underlying tones of worry in her demeanor. 

    Later that day Brad calls her office and claims to be "returning her call" but Cass insists she never called him. It's chalked up to a simple mistake on his secretary's end. 

    Days later while out to dinner with Brad the couple runs into Lisa and her date and Lisa asks Cass "did you ask Brad?" to which Cass is confused. Lisa claims she asked Cass to attend a party she is throwing and invite Brad to come with her but Cass has no memory of Lisa asking this.

    The two attend Lisa's party and Lisa greets them by apologizing for missing Cass' call earlier that day, a call that Cass insists she didn't make. 

    The next day Cass and Brad go to the beach where Cass tells him about her scar and the effect it had on her life and Brad tells her she's amazing with or without a scar. They go back to her apartment so she can change before dinner. When she comes out of her room Brad is on the phone with his mother and relays a message to "thank Cass for the flowers". A bouquet of flowers had been delivered to her with a card baring Cass's name yet she didn't send them. 

    She tells Brad about all the strange incidents and how they are beginning to frighten her. Irritatingly Brad brushes it off as practical jokes but begins doing some sleuthing. He learns that Edith had visited his mother, falsely telling her that Cass had been in England for psychiatric care and that Lisa had been making fake calls and placing orders under Cass's name to convince Brad that she was seriously mentally ill. 

    Together the two tell off Lisa and Aunt Edith, with Cass walking out of their lives to start her new life with Brad.

Symphony in the Sky

    Cheryl Stevens, Cher as her friends call her, is a nurse. She's known she's wanted to be a nurse ever since she was a child due to her mother having been a nurse and her father being a surgeon. However she's simultaneously had another career goal since she was a child, that of flight stewardess. Having achieved one she now wants to achieve the other. She's been accepted to stewardess school and now has to tell her loved ones. 

    Her parents are upset by her career change, feeling as tho she is degrading herself. Her boyfriend Tom, who is a surgeon at the same hospital as her, is furious at first because he worries it will waylay their plans to marry after his residency, but once he's digested the news he accepts Cher's decision and suggests they place their relationship on pause so she can be free to date other men while she's away.

Cher worries that this will open Tom up to dating Lee, his ex girlfriend that Cher is sure still carries a torch for him, and has recently been placed as nurse in Tom's surgery ward. 

    Away at stewardess school Cher becomes close to her roommate, Vicki, who has a handsome, young, sky-writer brother named Biff. After meeting at their graduation ceremony Cher and Biff hit it off right away and begin going on dates regularly whenever Cher's work schedule takes her to San Francisco, where Biff lives. 

    

    When Cher is with Biff she feels as tho there is no other man she could love, however when she's back home with Tom she feels the same way about him. She's been open and honest with both men about the other and is struggling to figure out what her heart wants. 

    When she goes home for thanksgiving she's asked to work a nursing shift at the hospital as they are short staffed due to the Hong Kong Flu. There she's told Tom and Lee have been inseparable, working closely side by side.

    Biff is flying to a sky writing job that day and will be flying over the hospital at 3 o'clock, he's arranged for Cheryl to look in the sky for him at that time so he can "dip his wings" at her but when she goes outside at the arranged time, instead of the friendly gesture, he writes "CHERYL I LOVE YOU" in the sky in full view of Tom and Lee.

    Back at work after the holiday Cher torments herself with thoughts of Tom and Lee together. Her airline has a new flight to Mazatlan, Mexico which she is assigned to. On her first trip there Biff meets her and they spend two romantic days at a beach hotel during which he subtly suggests they get engaged.

    Cher leaves Mexico more confused than ever but when a fiery explosion erupts on her flight home her first thoughts are of Tom and the fear she'll never get to tell him she loves him again. She realizes then what her heart wants.

    Cher extinguishes the fire and is hailed for her quick and calm action in the face of danger. Once safely landed she arranges to visit home and calls Tom telling him she has big new. Tom says he has big news as well and Cher convinces herself it's an engagement to Lee.

    Back home she tells him he is the only man she loves and he tells her he's been offered a job in Washington D.C. and he wants them to marry and move there together.

- This is the second book I've read by Laura C. Raef. Her writing style is somewhat different then I've encountered before, I'm not quite sure how to describe it. It feels quite boring but also paced well enough to keep me reading and wanting to know what happens next. Quite an interesting combination.

- I'm no medical student but the ways the medical parts were written, such as the baby being born during a flight, felt like they were written from an educated point of view. I couldn't find any information on Laura Raef so I don't know if she had experience as a nurse but I certainly wouldn't be surprised. 

- The pregnant lady on the plane was dumb. She's a Canadian who was visiting her husband who is working in Chicago and when she goes into labor, instead of going to the hospital and having her husband nearby she sneaks on a plane so her baby can be born in Canada. This almost cost the baby it's life. Very stupid lady.

- The explosion in the plane bathroom was never explained. I was curious what caused it. Was it a malfunction or had a passenger done something?

- I actually really liked Cheryl, I thought she's really cool. Her double career ambition is admirable and I like how she was honest with Tom and Biff about the other, not wanting to play games or be deceitful at all.

    Overall it was a pretty nice read. I thought at this point I'd be sick of flight stewardess stories but this showed me otherwise.

Barbie's Hawaiian Holiday

    Barbie's family heads to Hawaii for the Christmas break. Her father had been stationed there during the war and became friends with a British solider who moved there permanently after his service. He has invited the Roberts to stay with his family which consist of Clara, his uptight British wife and Gerald, his teenage son. Barbie is excited to spend the vacation with the boy until she meets him and sees he is only 13. 

 

    While Barbie and Gerald are at the beach Barbie meets Apaki, a handsome Hawaiian college student and avid surfer. Taken with Barbie he offers to teach her how to surf which Barbie is ecstatic over.

However when she reveals this plan to her hostess, Clara is appalled. She finds surfing improper and disapproves of Barbie partaking in the sport. 

    After the first day of her lessons Barbie sees Gerald out on the waves and is very upset. She disapproves of him surfing behind his mothers back and insists he tell her about it which he refuses to do. 

    Apaki will be partaking in an upcoming surfing competition and after Barbie introduces him to both families, and they like him, they all decide to go to the competition. When Clara enjoys watching the surfers Barbie pulls Gerald aside and insists he tell his mother he surfs but he again refuses. Instead he takes off into the waves with a surf board, getting in Apaki's way, and unintentionally making him lose the competition. Apaki is not mad but he informs Gerald's parent of his secret hobby and they approve.

- This book would have been really nice except for Barbie being a busy body. I really couldn't stand that. It pushed the narrative that you should always tell your parents everything because they will always understand. Was the writer unaware that not all parents are saints? If I was Gerald I would have gotten my ass beat. 

- I love that Barbie's romance is with a Hawaiian boy. I think it makes her experience is Hawaii more authentic and romantic than if she met another tourist. 

- I found it a little amusing how Ken was worried Barbie was going to meet a "beach boy" and then she does just that. Poor Ken.

    Overall this was a pretty good book, you've just got to overlook Barbie acting like the arbiter of morality. Also worth noting how lovely the cover art is. Its simple but really gives the Barbie aesthetic.