Barefoot

This was a great read for the beach! I'm glad I chose to read it in the middle of summer.

Vicki, her sister Brenda, and Vicki's best friend, Melanie go to the family cottage in Nantucket for the summer. Vicki has cancer and needs looking after, as do her young children, Blaine and Porter. But Brenda is desperately trying to write a screenplay, and Melanie is newly pregnant and has morning sickness all day. So they hire a young nanny Josh, to watch the children all week, until Vicki's husband Ted visits on the weekends. The boys take to Josh straight away, as do each of the women, in their own way.  There are lots of broken hearts and secrets withheld, and it is interesting to see who ends up with whom.

Vicki's story of cancer and chemotherapy is very honest and harrowing, and her concerns about how her family will go on without her are quite difficult and yet touching to read. Brenda's experiences teaching literature at university brought back fond memories of my own uni studies, and Josh's clever nannying techniques were like the ABC guide to parenting!

This is a book about choices. While we are often warned to think before we act, in this story the heart simply wants what the heart wants. And that works out for some. But not all.

My rating ****