Thursday, June 13, 2019

About the Book

Book: Summer by The Tides

Author: Denise Hunter

Genre: Christian Fiction, Contemporary Romance

Release Date: May 21, 2019

From the bestselling author of The Convenient Groom(now a beloved Hallmark Original movie) comes a heartfelt story of family secrets, forgiveness, and unexpected romance.

Following a painful betrayal, Maddy Monroe’s love life is a wreck, and her restaurant career is in shambles. When her grandmother goes missing, she and her estranged sisters converge at the family beach house in Sea Haven, North Carolina. Being with uptight Nora and free-spirited Emma at the place where their family broke apart is a struggle, and undercurrents of jealousy and resentment threaten to pull the sisters under. In the midst of the storm, sparks begin to fly between Maddy and Gram’s maddening neighbor, Connor Murphy.

As the sisters pack up the family belongings, memories of idyllic, slow-paced summers are resurrected. But long-buried secrets also come to light as Maddy discovers that all was not as it appeared that last summer in Sea Haven—nor today in the seemingly perfect lives of her sisters.

As family tensions rise and Connor causes tumult in Maddy’s heart, the sisters must find a way to accept each other for the women they’ve become before the bitterness of the past destroys their hope for a future.

Click here to purchase your copy.

About the Author

Denise Hunter is the internationally published bestselling author of more than 25 books, including A December Bride and The Convenient Groom, which have been adapted into original Hallmark Channel movies. She has won The Holt Medallion Award, The Reader’s Choice Award, The Carol Award, The Foreword Book of the Year Award, and is a RITA finalist. When Denise isn’t orchestrating love lives on the written page, she enjoys traveling with her family, drinking green tea, and playing drums. Denise makes her home in Indiana where she and her husband are rapidly approaching an empty nest. To learn more about Denise, visit her website DeniseHunterBooks.com; Facebook: AuthorDeniseHunter; Twitter: @DeniseAHunter; Instagram: deniseahunter.

Read an Excerpt from Summer by the Tides

MADDY MONROE WAS COWERING behind a ficus tree near the hostess station when her cell phone rang. Her hands shook as she silenced the phone before it drew the attention of the staff.

She jabbed the elevator button for the third time. “Come on, come on.” A star could be born in interstellar space, a polar valley carved by a glacier in the time it took the elevator to reach this floor. Stairs were not an option, as she was on the twentieth floor of the Waterford building and sporting heels.

She sniffled. Drat. She seemed to be crying. She swiped a hand under her eyes, heedless of her makeup.

She heard voices, Nick’s boisterous laugh. Maddy shrank deeper into the ficus and finally, finally, the elevator dinged its arrival.

“Maddy?” Noelle’s concerned voice tunneled down the hall. “Maddy, wait.”

“Oh, come on,” she muttered, tapping her fingers against her leg until the gold doors crept open. As soon as she could fit, she squeezed inside and punched the ground-floor button.

She didn’t draw a breath until the doors sealed and the elevator began to drop. She placed a palm over a heart that was threatening to beat its way out of her chest. Her white blouse clung to her back, and her skin prickled beneath her arms.

She closed her eyes, the scene that had just transpired playing out in fast-forward in her mind. And then, as if that montage weren’t painful enough, the image of Nick’s face appeared. The look on his face just before he’d kissed her good-bye last night.

Nick. She clamped her teeth together until her jaw ached.

There had been signs. Many of them, really, she was realizing now. They ranged from whisper-subtle to neon-sign obvious. But like so many other walking clichés before her, she was only seeing them in retrospect.

Maddy opened her eyes to the buttery sunlight streaming through her blinds. She scrambled for her iPhone to check the time. But as she did so, the events of yesterday washed over her like a tsunami. She didn’t have to get up at all, because she didn’t have a job anymore.

Her cell buzzed with an incoming call, and she squinted bleary-eyed at the unfamiliar number on the screen before declining it.

She drooped against her pillow, only now aware of how fat and swollen her eyes felt. Of the persistent achy lump pushing at the back of her throat. Her heartbeat made the bed quake. Her eyes burned with tears. Yesterday’s anger had faded, and something worse had filled its spot.

Yesterday she’d come home, changed into yoga pants, and worked in her little garden until she was too exhausted to do anything but flop on the sofa. She hadn’t fallen asleep until after three o’clock in the morning.

She didn’t want to talk to anyone, didn’t want to see anyone. She didn’t even want to be awake today. She pulled the covers over her head and prayed for oblivion.

I liked the setting of the story and found the quaint place in Sea Haven, North Carolina very inviting. The author describes the area so well, you could feel the sand on your feet as you walked along the beach. It was a great place at Gram's cottage in the summertime. Those memories are special to Maddy and soon she will find herself back at Gram's place when she receives an upsetting phone call.

I really liked the clever way Gram was able to get all three sisters to come back to their summer hangout. Maddy, Nora and Emma each descend on the place frantic about their grandmother. A phone call from her neighbor has them worried that Gram has disappeared. Will they be able to mend their relationship between them? Can each sister learn to trust again and lean on each other?

Conner was a welcome addition to the story as Gram's next door neighbor. He always watched out for her and knew something was wrong when he hadn't seen her in a few days. Maddy didn't trust Conner as soon as she met him. She thought he had something to do with Gram's disappearance and didn't trust him at all. I thought she judged him very quickly and didn't care for her attitude towards him. She has come there with a preconceived notion that Conner is not a nice person.

The story starts to take shape as we learn that the family hasn't really been close in a long time. Nora and Emma haven't talked to each other in awhile and having them there together at the cottage is going to be explosive. There are lots of secrets that have been hidden in Maddy's family that has caused hurt so deep that it has divided the family. It is easy to hold a grudge for some people but what I have realized is life is too short. All the years we walk around refusing to forgive the person who hurt us, takes precious time away that you can never get back.

It was like a domino effect as secrets starting coming out and soon the sisters learn that growing up their mother had protected them from a secret to keep the family together. It was easy for each sister to blame their mother but they never knew what a precious gift she gave them to protect their feelings all these years. There is a lot of repairing to do in the family and the most important lesson they will learn is about forgiveness and trust.

There is a romance blooming in the story that didn't surprise me at all. What I liked was how two people who had been hurt by relationships slowly let the wall they had around themselves fall away. The sisters luck with men are not going well and I think that helped them at least try to communicate with each other. All three are struggling with a relationship and it will take a miracle for these sisters to reconnect. There was something that Conner said to Maddy that I really liked. He said," When I can't trust others and I can't trust myself, I can always trust God." It was a perfect way for Conner to share his faith with Maddy and let her know God was there waiting for her to turn to Him for guidance. Overall good story about a broken family that must leave their pride behind, learn to trust again and find happiness.

I received a copy of this book from Celebrate Lit. The review is my own opinion.