Dear Great
Book Guru, My friends and I take our
children every week to Storytime at Sea Cliff Beach and we stay afterwards for
lunch on the pavilion. Last week one of the parents mentioned a new book about
a cruise gone terribly bad - she called it a psychological thriller and
recommended it to us. Any thoughts? Fan
of Sea Cliff Beach.
Dear Fan of
Sea Cliff Beach, I just finished reading THE ANNIVERSARY by Stephanie Bishop
and it is quite the thriller. The novel opens with J.B.Blackwood, a forty year
old Australian author receiving news that she has received a major literary
award – think the Booker - but she is cautioned not to tell her much older
husband Patrick, a famous filmmaker because Blackwood tells us “he can’t be
trusted to keep secrets.” J.B. has
planned a luxurious cruise to celebrate their wedding anniversary and its final
destination will be the award ceremony. The couple had met years before when
she was his student at a prestigious university while he was married with an
infant son. The opening chapters recount their blissful courtship and travels
around the world. A few pages in we learn that a storm breaks out onboard the
ship and Patrick is thrown overboard. Gradually, we begin to suspect there is
more going on in the marriage than our narrator has suggested. Ultimately, we
realize that nothing we have been told – from childhood memories to present day
events - is to be trusted. A disturbing albeit compelling tale….recommended!