Monday, June 10, 2013

Off the Bookshelf: THREE BRIDES, NO GROOM

I like series. And not just because I write series.
This is kinda-sorta a series, because it's three interconnected stories.
The frame: Three women meet at the day of their college reunion at the big old fountain in the middle of campus where it seemed like everything happened. They didn't plan to meet there -- they barely knew each other in college -- but each came to reminisce about the huge change that occurred in their lives there on campus, near that fountain, on their last days of college.

And since this is a Debbie Macomber book, of course there's romance and humor and some tears and growth and humor and ... *sigh* good story all around. Or in this case, three.

What ties these stories together? Young women, planning their weddings in the very new future, who learn their grooms are ... to put it delicately ... scumsucking jerks. Do they let it destroy them? Well, if they did, this wouldn't be a Debbie Macomber book. It'd be literary fiction, which is always depressing -- why do people read it, anyway? No, these wounded women lick their wounds and mourn the deaths of their dreams, and then they gather up their strength and dignity and move on to make new lives for themselves. Better lives. And fall in love along the way. But Debbie plays a trick on us -- it doesn't seem like they'll get happily ever after with the new, better guy. At first. Each woman tells her story and leaves it at the, "And then he walked away," point. Then they promise they'll get back together for dinner that evening at the college reunion, to tell the rest of their stories. Before they do, the readers get the "rest of the story."

Always satisfying -- Debbie Macomber.

No comments: