September 13, 2011

Sea Glass


Sea Glass by Anita Shreve
Fiction
2002 Little, Brown and Company
Quit 8/11/11
Rating: DNF





Publisher’s Blurb:

With all the narrative power and emotional immediacy that have made her novels acclaimed international bestsellers, Anita Shreve unfolds a richly engaging tale of marriage, money, and troubled times—the story of a pair of young newlyweds who, setting out to build a life together in a derelict beach house on the Atlantic coast, soon discover how threatening the world outside their front door can be.

Sea Glass is the third volume in a series set on the coast of New Hampshire. The large coastal home featured in The Pilot’s Wife and Fortune’s Rocks is once again the focal point of this story. I thoroughly enjoyed the earlier novels in this series, so I was disappointed that this book didn’t live up to my expectations. Each chapter centers around one of six characters and is typically only a couple of pages in length. I usually don’t mind short chapters and can go back and forth between narrators, so it wasn’t the style of formatting that bothered me, but rather a general disinterest in the thin plot, coupled with a lack of affection for any of the characters.

Looking back on all the books I’ve read by Anita Shreve, it’s a wonder I keep trying to find a winner. I loved Fortune’s Rocks and The Pilot’s Wife, but was less impressed with A Wedding in December, Light on Snow, The Weight of Water, and now Sea Glass. I still have some of her backlist in my stacks, so we’ll see if any of them are as enjoyable as the first two I mentioned.

8 comments:

  1. I read this a while ago and enjoyed it, but didn't love it. I did love The Pilot's Wife. I didn't know Fortune's Rocks was part of the series - I'll have to look for it.

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  2. I know! I loved Fortune's Rock, remains one of my favourite books ever, and The Pilot's Wife was pretty good, too. And then I read this book.... I honestly didn't even feel like I was reading the same author...

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  3. Fortune's Rock is my favorite, too... wish they were all that good. Sea Glass was very forgettable, imo.

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  4. Kathy - Oh, I think you'll really enjoy Fortune's Rocks. I read it for a book club many years ago and we all loved it.

    Kailana - Wasn't Fortune's Rocks great?! I need to read it again. Or find it on audio and listen to it while I work.

    JoAnn - Well, I guess I didn't miss anything, did I?

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  5. I think I've read one or maybe two by Shreve, but don't have a good handle on whether those experiences were positive or negative. That leads me to think that they were probably more towards neutral. Sorry about this one.

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  6. Joy - If I had to pick one, I'd say Fortune's Rocks is my favorite. It's definitely worth reading, if you haven't already.

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  7. Oh! Fortune's Rock is on my TBR Shelf! However, I reserved the audiobook at the library. :)

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  8. Joy - Either way, I'm sure you'll enjoy the book. I'm actually listening to the book I'm currently reading since it was taking me so long to get interested. Not because the book's slow, but because I'm falling asleep so quickly and not reading very long at night.

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