shopping cart
Save up to 30% on our Staff Picks
Call us:  800-878-7323 HELP
McAfee SECURE helps keep you safe from identity theft, credit card fraud, spyware, spam, viruses and online scams.
Original Essays | September 23, 2009

Jonathan Lethem: IMG Stops: On Those Things My New Novel Forgot to Be About, Maybe



For me, there's a weird, unfathomable gulf — I almost wrote gulp — between the completion of a novel and its publication. Some days this duration feels interminable, as though the book has... Continue »
  1. $19.56 Sale Hardcover add to wish list

    Chronic City

    Jonathan Lethem

The Beach House

by Jane Green

The Beach House Cover

ISBN13: 9780670018857
ISBN10: 0670018856
Condition: Standard
Dustjacket: Standard
All Product Details

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

The perfect title for the perfect beach read from the New York Times bestselling Author

Jane Green is one of the preeminent authors of women's fiction today, and with each new novel, her audience grows. Green's avid and loyal fans follow her because she writes about the true-to-life dilemmas of womenand The Beach House will not disappoint.

Known in Nantucket as the crazy woman who lives in the rambling house atop the bluff, Nan doesn't care what people think. At sixty-five-years old, her husband died twenty years ago, her beauty has faded, and her family has flown. If her neighbors are away, why shouldn't she skinny dip in their swimming pools and help herself to their flowers? But when she discovers the money she thought would last forever is dwindling and she could lose her beloved house, Nan knows she has to make drastic changes.

So Nan takes out an ad: Rooms to rent for the summer in a beautiful old Nantucket home with water views and direct access to the beach. Slowly, people start moving into the house, filling it with noise, with laughter, and with tears. As the house comes alive again, Nan finds her family expanding. Her son comes home for the summer, and then an unexpected visitor turns all their lives upside-down.

Review:

"What begins as edgy and smart gets stuck in the sand in popular chick lit author Green's (Second Chance) soggy beach read. Richard and Daff separate after Richard has an affair, which plays havoc with their daughter, Jess. Bee and Daniel, who go to therapy to bridge their emotional gap, wind up facing the uncomfortable truth of what really separates them. Middle-aged Michael keeps finding all the wrong women, and Michael's dotty and endearing mom Nan, facing flagging finances, raises funds by letting rooms in her venerable Nantucket beach home, only to have to ward off ravenous developers. There's enough upheaval to keep the tale humming until the cast lands on Nan's doorstep, where, with unrelenting good humor and wisdom, the troubles with couples, families, kids, singles and sexual identity are predictably resolved before the Labor Day exodus. Unfortunately, the payoffs diminish as the story wears on. (June)" Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

Synopsis:

"New York Times"-bestselling author Green is one of the preeminent authors of women's fiction today. Her avid and loyal fans follow her because she writes about the true-to-life dilemmas of women.

About the Author

Jane Green's novels Second Chance and To Have and to Hold were New York Times bestsellers. Swapping Lives, The Other Woman, Bookends, and Babyville all appeared on The New York Times extended bestseller list for hardcover fiction. Jane was recently awarded the Fun Fearless Fiction Award by Cosmopolitan magazine.

What Our Readers Are Saying

Add a comment for a chance to win!
Average customer rating based on 2 comments:
cackleburr, June 22, 2009 (view all comments by cackleburr)
Found the book to be banal and boring. Too many story lines and not enough substance to any of them. Outcomes of the lives portrayed were all predictable...no surprises. I love books about life on the seashore. This one left me cold. Had to force myself to finish it. I did and heaved a big sigh of relief.
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
Bookwomyn, August 25, 2008 (view all comments by Bookwomyn)
I really, really wanted to like this book but could not. Maybe I'm just not that in to 'chick lit.'
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
(1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)
View all 2 comments

Product Details

ISBN:
9780670018857
Author:
Green, Jane
Publisher:
Viking Books
Subject:
Literary
Subject:
Children's 12-Up - Fiction - General
Subject:
Bed and breakfast accommodations
Subject:
Life change events
Subject:
Widows
Publication Date:
July 2008
Binding:
Hardcover
Grade Level:
General/trade
Language:
English
Pages:
341
Dimensions:
849x589x116 104

Other books you might like

  1. $5.25 Used Trade Paper add to wish list

    Swapping Lives

    Jane Green
  2. $4.95 Used Mass Market add to wish list

    The Pact: A Love Story

    Jodi Picoult
  3. $3.99 New Trade Paper add to wish list
  4. $14.50 Used Hardcover add to wish list
  5. $8.95 Used Trade Paper add to wish list

    New Moon

    Stephenie Meyer
  6. $5.99 New Mass Market add to wish list

    All-In

    Pete Hautman

Related Aisles

  • back to top

Powell's City of Books is an independent bookstore in Portland, Oregon, that fills a whole city block with more than a million new, used, and out of print books. Shop those shelves — plus literally millions more books, DVDs, and eBooks — here at Powells.com.