Reviewer: Amy Lignor
Title: Promises to Keep
Author: Jane Green
Publisher: Viking
ISBN-13: 978-0-670-02179-6
Release Date: June 2010
Genre/Sub-genre: Women's Fiction
Year/Setting: Present day, NY
Overall Rating: 4.5
Sexual Content Rating: None/Subtle
Language (Profanity/Slang) Content Rating: None/Mild
Violent Content Rating: None/Minimal
Jane's Website/Blog: www.janegreen.com
Dear Readers:
I am a fan of Jane Green, especially her New York Times bestseller, The Beach House. Ms. Green has always had a way of "speaking" to her readers that ends up forcing them to laugh out loud and have the best cry of their lives – all from the same book. So…get yourself a glass of wine and some tissues for this one.
In this newest offering, the writing is still as perfect as it’s always been. The two main characters are Callie Perry, who lives with her husband and two children in the small town of Bedford, New York. She has the "perfect life" in almost every way; she loves her husband more than life, and her children are normal, happy, pains in the butt. She took up photography after she was married to give herself something more to do because her husband travels a great deal with his job. She succeeded in building a photography business, and also seems to adore her "white-picket-fence" existence.
Her younger sister is Steffi. Steffi is the opposite of Callie. She lives with a rock-star whose musician friends are always over at their apartment in NYC getting high. She loves to cook and is currently a vegan chef at a local restaurant. Her jobs are "held" for usually no longer than a year – as well as her boyfriends – and Steffi is finding herself coming to the newest crossroads in her life. One of her friends, a publisher by the name of Mason, offers her a house for the winter located in Sleepy Hollow. Not only that, but he also offers her a babysitting job and hands her the reins to Fingal – his HUGE Scottish deerhound for her to take care of while he goes with his rich, fancy wife to England for a year.
Other characters that are presented include Lila – who is a friend to Callie and Steffi – who has waited a long time to fall in love and has finally, after forty-two years, found a man named Ed who is absolutely perfect for her. Honor is the mother to Steffi and Callie. Honor is a good woman who divorced their father years before because she needed something "more" to hold her interest. She loves her children, but there is still animosity between her and her ex-husband George that simply refuses to disappear. George, their father, is a man who definitely is holding some type of grudge. After Honor left him, he has found himself marrying and divorcing others, as well as having live-in girlfriends from time to time; he simply can’t find a way to be truly happy. When an illness strikes the family, the story delves into the relationships that they all have with one another, and the characters find common ground by crying, laughing, and forgiving each other for any past mistakes.
Again…get out the Kleenex for this one: A truly well-written story that will break your heart and revive your hope and faith in family.
Until next time, Amy
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