Sunset Beach by Mary Kay Andrews
Published by St. Martin’s Press on May 7, 2019
Genres: American Literature, Contemporary Women, Fiction
Pages: 432
Format: ARC, eBook, Paperback
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Pull up a lounge chair and have a cocktail at Sunset Beach – it comes with a twist.
Drue Campbell’s life is adrift. Out of a job and down on her luck, life doesn’t seem to be getting any better when her estranged father, Brice Campbell, a flamboyant personal injury attorney, shows up at her mother’s funeral after a twenty-year absence. Worse, he’s remarried – to Drue’s eighth grade frenemy, Wendy, now his office manager. And they’re offering her a job.
It seems like the job from hell, but the offer is sweetened by the news of her inheritance – her grandparents’ beach bungalow in the sleepy town of Sunset Beach, a charming but storm-damaged eyesore now surrounded by waterfront McMansions.
With no other prospects, Drue begrudgingly joins the firm, spending her days screening out the grifters whose phone calls flood the law office. Working with Wendy is no picnic either. But when a suspicious death at an exclusive beach resort nearby exposes possible corruption at her father’s firm, she goes from unwilling cubicle rat to unwitting investigator, and is drawn into a case that may – or may not – involve her father. With an office romance building, a decades-old missing persons case re-opened, and a cottage in rehab, one thing is for sure at Sunset Beach: there’s a storm on the horizon.
Sunset Beach is a compelling ride, full of Mary Kay Andrews’ signature wit, heart, and charm.
When I saw today’s book, Sunset Beach by Mary Kay Andrews available for review from St. Martin’s Press, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on it based on the last Mary Kay Andrews book I read! I just knew this was going to be a fabulous summer read — well for me, kind of a late spring read, but since it releases May 7, it can be an early summer read for you!
The story takes place in and around St. Petersburg, Florida — coincidence, huh? (….. read bio below…..) Drue Campbell is the main character and she’s been suffering one problem after another, most recently having suffered a knew injury from kite boarding followed by losing her waitressing job in Ft. Lauderdale. She’s broke and has no idea what she’s doing next.
Then there’s her dad, Brice Campbell, the one who ran off when she was young, leaving Drue to be raised by only her mom. Now that her mother has died of cancer and Drue is on her own without any close friends, she’s chalk full of resentment against this guy, her “dad”, the man who has just shown up offering her this job at his law firm on the other coast of Florida in the Tampa/St. Petersburg area.
Drue figures she doesn’t have much other choice but to accept the job given the fact that she doesn’t have any other prospects or cash, so she works the phones at the law firm screening calls to determine whether folks have cases for her father’s personal injury case. It’s not a job she loves, but it is one she can do and gives her some money to begin to rehabilitate the seaside cottage she inherited from her grandparents at Sunset Beach.
As she starts to rehab the cottage and her life, Drue starts to find herself again. She also begins to investigate a mysterious death at a local resort that has landed in her lap at the law firm. (You’ll have to read Sunset Beach to learn more about this story line.)
There is so much to love about Sunset Beach….. it has great twists and turns, excellent plotting and very believable characters. Sunset Beach has a well written story and easy to read, which makes it an ideal summer read. I highly recommend it for anyone wanting to escape into an quick and easy read.
Mary Kay Andrews is the New York Times bestselling author of 24 novels including THE WEEKENDERS, BEACH TOWN, LADIES’ NIGHT, SUMMER RENTAL, DEEP DISH and HISSY FIT.
A native of St. Petersburg, Florida, she received a B.A. in journalism from The University of Georgia and was a newspaper reporter for 14 years. The last ten years of her career were spent as a features reporter for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
She is married to her high school sweetheart, Tom Trocheck, with whom she has a 40-year (and counting) collaboration yielding two grown children, two adorable grandchildren and countless memorable kitchen experiences.
After a 14-year career working as a reporter at newspapers including The Savannah Morning News, The Marietta Journal and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, where she spent the final ten years of her career, she left journalism in 1991 to write fiction.
Her first novel, EVERY CROOKED NANNY, was published in 1992 by HarperCollins Publishers. She went on to write ten critically acclaimed mysteries under her real name. In 2002, she assumed the pen name Mary Kay Andrews with the publication of SAVANNAH BLUES. In 2006, HISSY FIT became her first New York Times bestseller, followed by eleven more New York Times, USA Today and Publisher’s Weekly bestsellers. To date, her novels have been published in German, Italian, Polish, Slovenian, Hungarian, Dutch, Czech and Japanese.
Mary Kay Andrews’ first cookbook, THE BEACH HOUSE COOKBOOK, published by St. Martin’s Press, goes on sale May 2. She and her family divide their time between Atlanta and Tybee Island, where they cook up new recipes in two restored beach homes, The Breeze Inn and Ebbtide, both named after fictional places in Mary Kay’s novels. In between cooking and plotting her next novel, Mary Kay is an intrepid treasure hunter whose favorite pastime is junking and fixing up old houses.
Connect with Mary Kay Andrews on social media ~~
WEBSITE // FACEBOOK // TWITTER // INSTAGRAM // PINTEREST
I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book that I received from St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley. All views expressed are my honest opinion.
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