Susannah's Garden
by Debbie Macomber
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Book Summary Information
Author: Debbie MacomberEdition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2007-04-01
ISBN: 0778324443
Number of pages: 400
Publisher: Mira
Book Reviews of Susannah's Garden
Book Review: Weak, emotionally overwrought plot about a mother and daughter relationship
Summary: 3 Stars
Every now and then I indulge in a guilty pleasure, sometimes taking in a contemporary novel that's written on the light side. I've read two of Debbie Macomber's previous novels, and while I didn't find them that challenging or stimulating, they were good for several hours of mindless entertainment, and certainly better than turning on the television.
Susannah lives near Seattle, and has what can be considered a good life -- she's married to a successful dentist, has two nearly grown children, a nice home, and a career as a teacher. Summer break is approaching and Susannah is going to return to the hometown where she grew up in Eastern Washington. A personal crisis is threatening to overturn her carefully arranged life.
Susannah's mother, Vivian, is clearly not well after the death of her husband, the local judge. George Leary was a strict man, running his family pretty much as he did his courtroom, even after a tragic accident killed his only son, Doug. That loss affected everyone in the family, especially Susannah, who was away finishing up her schooling in France. The loss of her brother hit her hard, and Susannah struggled not only with death, but the coldness from her father, and her mother's own manipulative nature. Now Vivian seems to be unable to cope with being a widow, and has been found wandering alone in the streets, confused, and accusing her neighbors and housekeeper of theft and spying on her.
Now Susannah has to travel to Colville, and try to persuade her mother that it might be best if she entered an 'assisted living' arrangement. And Vivian, with all of the toughness of an elderly person, is equally determined to stay in her own home, thank you. Once Susannah arrives at her mother's home, a not-too-subtle war begins, with both sides focused on what they want.
To complicate matters further, Susannah is finding herself thinking about her high-school sweetheart, Jake Priestly, who vanished soon after her brother died. More annoying still, there's her daughter, Chrissie, home from college from the summer and frustrated by the lack of a boyfriend, a job, and turned into the family maid-of-all-work for her brother and father. Chrissie in turn, comes to Colville to 'help' her mother with Vivian, and getting the place tidying, but soon enough she's off having a good time with one of the local bad boys.
As Susannah struggles to make sense of things and get her mother settled, we encounter old friends, possible ghosts, family secrets and enough self-talk and musing and slamming doors to fill at least a week of soap-operas. Susannah, despite her flurrying about, is more of a passive spectator throughout the book, and muddying things as she goes about.
This is the third book that I've read by Macomber, and I suspect that it will be my last. I was only interested in the Blossom Street novels (there have been two published, and a third one has just been released in hardcover) because there was knitting and cats involved, two of my pet interests. And several of the characters in the two novels had been through similar experiences that I had been.
But here, Susannah is wandering through life with blinkers on, not realizing just how good she's got things, and her mother Vivian is a figure of sympathy as well as being a harridan. Chrissie is a brat, and other characters are simple one notes. In short, I cared little for anyone in the novel as they go through their middle class lives without realizing that most things are pretty messy at times.
Macomber's writing style is of the sort best described as 'women's fiction;' simplistic and with an underlaying moralizing tone. Most of the time, I can put up with that. Sadly, the writing is pretty simplistic too -- you're not going to find any great flights of fancy or deep thought here. It's pure vanilla, without anything in here to offend anyone -- unless you actually live the real world.
The only thing that saves this one from a one or two-star rating is that the main character is a middle aged woman, which was appealing in our youth-obsessed culture. But Macomber makes Susannah such a bland woman that I found it very hard to connect with her, or care about her problems.
Overall, three stars and a not recommended, unless you're a die-hard fan of Macomber. I say skip it, and try for someone else. Better yet, just leave the book on the shelf or get it from the library. At the end of the paperback release, there is an excerpt from Macomber's next book, Back to Blossom Street, which looks to have Susannah return as a character to an earlier series.
Eek.
Summary of Susannah's Garden
When Susannah Nelson turned eighteen, she said goodbye to her boyfriend, Jake?and never saw him again. She never saw her brother, Doug, again, either. He died unexpectedly that same year.
Now, at fifty, Susannah finds herself regretting the paths not taken. Long married, a mother and a teacher, she should be happy. But she feels there's something missing in her life. Not only that, she's balancing the demands of an aging mother and a temperamental twenty-year-old daughter.
Her mother, Vivian, a recent widow, is having difficulty coping and living alone, so Susannah goes home to Colville, Washington. In returning to her parents' house, her girlhood friends and the garden she's always loved, she also returns to the past?and the choices she made back then. What she discovers is that things are not always as they once seemed. Some paths are dead ends. But some gardens remain beautiful?.
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