Sunday, December 4, 2011

A Summer in Europe-Marilyn Brant

A Summer in Europe


Marilyn Brant

Kensington, Dec 1 2011, $15.00

ISBN: 9780758261519



Her two younger brothers called respectively from Atlanta and Seattle to wish the old lady Gwendolyn Reese a happy thirtieth birthday. She expects at lunch, her boyfriend Richard to propose, but when he does not she is very disappointed. Later that day, she joins her aunt for dinner with Bea’s S&M club. Bea gifts her niece with a month long vacation in Europe with her club to get her relative out of a rut. Gwen is unsure thirty days playing Sudoku and mah-jongg will be fun, but goes on the trip figuring she can delete from her to do list the great sites of London and the mainland.



Gwen meets the Edwards brothers, Thoreau and Emerson. The latter introduces her to the best of the continent, but though attracted to the charismatic sibling, Gwen has Richard back in Iowa overlooking the muddy Mississippi. However, Richard rushes to England with a plan to save his relationship.



The strong cast (including European locations) provides an engaging coming of age contemporary tale. Character driven, readers will feel they are on tour with the S&M club enjoying the sights and the antics of Thoreau and especially Emerson. With homage to Andrew Lloyd Webber, E. M. Forester, and physics; Marilyn Brant writes an engaging tale of a woman who starts off chronologically as thirty, intellectually middle aged and experimentally a young teen.



Harriet Klausner

No comments: