A SUMMER IN SONOMA

Author: Robyn Carr ISBN: 9780778328704 7/2010 CONTEMPORARY Publisher: MIRA

They've been best friends since seventh grade. But this summer, teetering on the threshold of thirty, four women are going to need each other more than ever. Cassie has sworn off romance after yet another bad date. Yet deep down, she's still looking for Mr. Forever. A long-haired biker doesn't figure into her plans, so where's the harm in touring the back roads of Sonoma on a Harley with Walt Arneson? Julie, married too young to her high school sweetheart, who can get her pregnant with a glance, wonders how her life became all about leaky faucets and checkbook balances. Maybe love isn't enough to sustain the hottest couple in town. Marty's firefighter husband has forgotten all about romance, and an old flame begins to look mighty tempting. Beth, a busy doctor trapped in a body that's betrayed her yet again, is becoming a difficult patient and a secretive friend. Life can change in an instant...or a summer. And having old friends to lean on can only up the chances of happily-ever-after.

RRAH's THOUGHTS AND PONDERINGS:

Robyn Carr sets her contemporary romance A SUMMER IN SONOMA in Sonoma County, California, where four best girlfriends grew up and now live as adults. While the focus of the story seems to be on Cassie Rasmussen, an Emergency Room nurse who has been looking for Mr. Right forever, her friends Julie (a stay at home mom fighting an overwhelmingly tight budget), Beth (a successful OB/Gyn fighting her second bout of breast cancer) and Marty (a hair stylist fighting her husband’s waning care of her, the household chores and his personal hygiene), all get significant airtime as well. Cassie’s immediate story begins with a date with yet another Mr. Wrong who assaults her in his car in a dark parking lot. She’s rescued by a tall ponytailed biker dude, and though his external package doesn’t meet her criteria of Mr. Right, she decides that he’ll be the perfect best buddy. Walt is perfectly happy to be a pal, considering that Cassie has just been attacked by a guy that she thought to be one of the “good guys,” a paramedic, and her level of trust will need to be repaired. Will she be able to get over the fact that he seems to just be a guy working in a bike shop with no real future?

Carr could be narrating the lives of four real women; her characters are that genuine. I hated finishing the story because I felt like Cassie, Marty, Julie and Beth had become my friends and I don’t want to let them go. Being a breast cancer survivor, I know that Beth’s feelings and thoughts are very close to my own. She’s afraid people will look at her differently again, walk on eggshells, not be “real” around her. Having fought my own financial battles, Julie’s anguish was heartbreaking. I want to give her a hug and a casserole myself. I found my own Mr. Right at a fairly young age, but I have friends who are still looking and I know their pain of loneliness. Although my Mr. Right is no neat freak, my dad could compare to Marty’s clueless husband; so hard to pound information into their heads, even when it is right in front of them.

The lovely rides into wine country, the beach, and the mountains, were pure relief from the strife back in town, and all the stops along the way for delicious meals only added to the pleasure. I love how Cassie finally sees that she’s been judging Walt merely on appearances and how patient he is with her fragile feelings. He is the sweetest of lovers and an inspiration. Women everywhere should read the passages about Walt to their own significant others.

A SUMMER IN SONOMA is a real winner! I had to read it straight through, and now I wish there was more. Carr serves up a brilliant fearsome foursome of lifelong friends, their loves, their tribulations, and thankfully, their triumphs. This is a superlative romance with plenty of passion, an affirmation of friends and a manual for hope. What a great read!

Susan Barton