SUMMER AT WILLOW LAKE

Author: Susan Wiggs ISBN: 0778323250 8/2006 CONTEMPORARY Publisher: MIRA

Real estate expert Olivia Bellamy reluctantly trades a trendy Manhattan summer for her family's old resort camp in the Catskills, where her primary task will be renovating the bungalow colony of her grandparents, who want one last summer together filled with fun, friends and family. A posh resort in its heyday, the camp is in in disarray and Olivia is forced to hire contractor Connor Davis—a still-smoldering flame from her own summers at camp. But as the days grow warm, not even the inviting blue waters of Willow Lake can cool the passions flaring or keep shocking secrets at bay. The nostalgic joy of summers past breathes new promise into a special place and people...a promise meant to last long after the season ends.

RRAH's THOUGHTS AND PONDERINGS:

This is the first book of what is promising to be a wonderful new series by Susan Wiggs.

Olivia Bellamy grows up with all the privileges her family's money can buy. But she would trade everything just to have her parents happy and happily married. The summer camp she attends in the Catskills has been owned by her family for generations. Unfortunately, that doesn't help the chubby, insecure Lolly feel like she belongs. Every summer she spends there seems to create more painful reminders that she will always be the fat girl at camp, that no one but her own cousins befriend. That is, until the summer she turns 12 years old and the gorgeous outcast, Connor Davis, shows up for his first summer at Camp Kioga. On the surface these two seem like opposites in all ways. She's quiet and bookish, he's hunky and athletic. She's from a well known wealthy family, he has an alcoholic father and is going to Camp Kioga as a charity case. But they both find in each other friendship and acceptance as these two misfits somehow fit.

Their last year at camp, Connor and Lolly are camp counselors, and their friendship turns into something much deeper. But an incident on the last night of camp leaves them both with broken hearts, and neither realize it has the power to affect their lives for a very long time.

The author creates in Lolly an insecure girl many women will be able to relate to. You can't help but be moved by her emotions of triumph when she comes back to town to renovate the camp as a sexy successful young woman, that Conner can't even recognize as his best friend from summers past. Or understand that no matter what outside transformations have occurred, it's hard to let go of the old insecurities.

This story is touched with sweetness from the onset. If you have memories of going to summer camp, or of just being young, unsure, and in love, this story will resonate with you. The secondary storylines and characters were also moving, but I have to say a little distracting when jumping from one time period to another. It may very well be I felt that way, just because I loved Olivia and Connor so much and I hated to be away from them even for a page or two. For all the ugly ducklings who maybe didn't get their do over or even for the swans who did, it doesn't get any sweeter than losing yourself for a SUMMER AT WILLOW LAKE. Happy reading!

Deana Monteleone