Butternut Summer: A Novel (The Butternut Lake Trilogy) By Mary McNear Harper Collins August 2014
Twenty-one year old Daisy Keegan is home for the
Butternut Summer: A Novel (The Butternut Lake Trilogy) By Mary McNear Harper Collins August 2014
Twenty-one year old Daisy Keegan is home for the summer before beginning her senior year at the University of Minnesota. Daisy works at Pearl’s, her mother’s café. When Daisy was three, her father, Jack, walked out on her and her mom, Caroline. Two years ago Jack contacted Daisy at school, and this past year Daisy agreed to meet with him. Jack has inherited a run-down shack and property from an old drinking buddy and it comes with a gorgeous view of clear, blue, Butternut Lake. With three years of Alcoholics Anonymous and sobriety to his credit Jack knows he needs to come back home and make amends to Caroline. He doesn’t think she will ever forgive him, but he hopes and prays that she will let him in her life in some small way. Rehabbing the shack he inherited keeps him away from temptation.
Daisy has caught the attention of Will Hughes, a twenty-three year old mechanic and a female magnet. Will doesn’t expect much out of life. He was abandoned by his mother as an infant and left with a mean, non-caring father. He spent much of his youth at Jason Weber’s home, whose mom just took Will under her wing. Will graduated from high school, but that is about it. Daisy agrees to go out with him, not knowing he expects to end the evening at the beach and in the back of his truck on a blanket. While she is tempted, she refuses to have sex with him. Will has never had a real date – movies, dinner, etc. – in his life; just the beach and blanket routine. Daisy agrees to teach him the fine art of dating, conversation, and so on. No one in Will’s life has ever paid him much consideration, but before Daisy he really didn’t care. Now, he wants to be worthy of her.
Caroline is conflicted. Nobody, other than the bank, knows that she will not be able to meet her second mortgage on time. Also, seeing Jack again makes her realize that she cannot continue dating Dusty, her beau for two years. And, Caroline does not approve of Daisy’s involvement with Will.
Kudos and a standing ovation to Mary McNear for her second “Butternut” story, which is a beautiful, relationship narrative. Ms. McNear has created near perfect characters that are flawed and sympathetic and believable. Her prose is smooth and mesmerizing and her storylines are credible and skillfully woven together. On a scale of one to ten, Butternut Summer truly rates, in this reader’s opinion, a fifteen.
Betty Cox, Staff Reader for ReaderToReader.com ...more