Low country

This is a genial, heartfelt yarn by a prolific, best-selling novelist who deserves her popularity. Siddons' latest novel features middle-aged Caroline Venable, a painter who spends too much time entertaining people associated with her husband Clay's land development business and a little too much time drinking to forget the accidental death of her daughter. But Caro has a good heart, and she loves the undeveloped barrier island off the South Carolina coast that was her special setting as a child. In fact, she owns the island--or believes she does. When she inadvertently learns that Clay has set in motion a plan to develop the island, her sense of betrayal runs deep. And what else Caro didn't know but soon finds out is that Clay's company is in dire straits--he faces losing, if not everything, at least a considerable portion of his holdings. But the wild horses on the island are what really concern Caro. What is to be their lot if their natural habitat is turned into a theme park? Caro takes a stand, and the result is ultimately a very moving tale of strength and truth arising from tragedy. ((Reviewed June 1 & 15, 1998)) Copyright 2000 Booklist Reviews

Fans will find some familiar elements here: a sympathetic Southern heroine, an unlikely love interest, and a South Carolina low country setting fragrant with salt air. Caro Venable is a captivating mix of beauty queen, drunk, artist, dutiful corporate wife, and mother still grieving her daughter's drowning. Her love of Peacock's Island clashes with her developer husband's plans to subdivide her grandfather's land and turn its native tribal settlement into a "theme park." Caro is also tempted by a wild, rebellious Cuban botanist who shares her love for the unspoiled island. The novel ends with a circle of completeness: a corrupt husband returning to his decent self, a wife returning to her husband's love, an orphaned child filling the void left by a girl's death, and the island saved from development. Readers of Siddons's other books (Up Island, HarperCollins, 1997) will not be disappointed. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 3/15/98.] Carol J. Bissett, Dittlinger Memorial Lib., New Braunfels, TX # Copyright 1998 Library Journal Reviews

A Siddons heroine of a familiar stripe, Caroline Aubrey Venable battles adversity and despair to save her South Carolina island in a somewhat unwieldy novel that again shows us a woman maturing under pressure. The death of her daughter five years earlier still shadows Caroline's life, and her occasional overindulgence in alcohol is something neither she nor her husband of 25 years will discussAso long as Caroline continues dutifully to play "mother superior" to the junior partners of her husband Clay's land-developing empire. When rumor comes to light that Clay's company plans to turn their low country home into a theme parkAthreatening the wild ponies that Caroline loves, not to mention the Gullahs who have lived there for centuriesACaroline is roused from her stupor. The leisurely pace and evocative atmospheric background of Siddons's fiction are in evidence here, and the confiding tone of this first-person narrative of betrayal and redemption offers few surprises. Some readers, however, may find Caroline annoyingly self-absorbed; may question why she doesn't object more strenuously when Luis CassellsAone of the islandersAcharacterizes Clay as "Mengele"; may find Siddons's depiction of Luis as a Cuban-Jewish Don Quixote improbable; may take umbrage at Caroline's patronization of the Gullahs; and may agree that the climax, while surprising, makes for a pat denouement. $250,000 ad/promo; U.K. rights to Little, Brown; first serial and dramatic rights: Virginia Barber; audio rights: HarperAudio; translation rights: HarperCollins; author tour. (July)

Spurred into action by her husband's plans to develop a beloved childhood retreat on a quiet, untouched island into a resort, Caroline must confront her empty life and drinking habit to save this special place in South Carolina