Kate Wilkinson is a book editor who receives a copy of the diary of Dr. Suzanne Bedford, started in 2003 for her then unborn son Nicholas. We go back and forth from Suzanne's life to Kate's, which is unfortunate because I enjoyed Suzanne's life so much more.
At the start of the movie, Suzanne is a busy Boston physician who discovers she has heart problems. Because having a baby would risk her health, Suzanne ends up breaking up with her boyfriend who wanted children, and also moves to a less stressful island community to take over a general practice.
Among her neighbors is the quirky Melanie, who advises her that the house where Suzanne lives and works needs fixing up. Melanie refers her to a man who calls himself Picasso, a Brown graduate who gave up the corporate life working for his father in order to become a writer. Soon the relationship between Suzanne and her handyman becomes more than just friendship. When she becomes pregnant, Suzanne is advised to have an abortion but she refuses.
Suzanne's patients, including hypochondriac Earl ('What seems to be the problem?' 'What isn't?') care a lot about her. Sadly, all is not perfect in this paradise.
Kate starts a relationship of her own with Matt, a client who wrote about the same community where Suzanne lived. Meanwhile, Kate reads the diary and wonders if the story is true, and she learns lessons that help her in her own life.
It took a while, but I ended up liking Suzanne a lot, and I enjoyed her story, even with the problems she experienced, and I wished things had ended differently for her. I thought Christina Applegate did an admirable job, and I liked her goofy neighbors. I even sort of liked her sensitive bearded husband.
As for Kate, I couldn't stand her. I won't take anything away from Kathleen Perkins' performance, but somehow I couldn't find her appealing, even when the character mentioned growing up in North Carolina. That's the only part of her story I enjoyed, and it lasted about five seconds. Worse yet, Kate's story wasn't even completely in chronological order, though later I understood certain things better.
I would have been much happier if the entire movie had been Suzanne's diary, with no flashbacks.
