The Sound of Glass

I had just returned from my first trip to Maine when I was presented with the opportunity to vie for an ARC of Karen White's new novel. I follow the life rule of "never judge a book by its cover" -- however, the moment I saw the cover of The Sound of Glass, I knew I had to read it. (I had just been looking at the sea glass I collected on the beach in Maine and there on the cover was an image of what I had hoped to do with my own pieces!)

Then I opened the book to discover a woman wrapped in an air of secrecy and got swept up alongside her in the explosion that lit up the night sky. When something hits her roof and slides off, my heart was pounding! What was she about to discover in her garden that had fallen so abruptly and unexpectedly from the sky? A piece of the aircraft? A body? Something worse?

For more on the gist of the story, see below. Suffice it to say, the story is engaging from the get-go. The characters are believable and feel real. Although you will likely intuit some of the character's motives before the narrative confirms your instinct (doesn't that make you feel smart?!), it does not detract from the story line. I found myself rooting for each of the characters along the way.

It turns out that the family "secret" which Merritt uncovers is a common issue for many families. I appreciate the gentle way in which White deals with what could be a delicate issue. Readers will find themselves thinking about the issue from different perspectives through the differing choices made by various women throughout the book. (Trying not to give away too much!)

The Sound of Glass is a quick read and one which I hope you will enjoy as much as I did! Thanks to the publisher for the ARC I received in exchange for this review.

From the Publisher . . .

The New York Times bestselling author of A Long Time Gone now explores a Southern family’s buried history, which will change the life of the woman who unearths it, secret by shattering secret.

It has been two years since the death of Merritt Heyward’s husband, Cal, when she receives unexpected news—Cal’s family home in Beaufort, South Carolina, bequeathed by Cal’s reclusive grandmother, now belongs to Merritt.

Charting the course of an uncertain life—and feeling guilt from her husband’s tragic death—Merritt travels from her home in Maine to Beaufort, where the secrets of Cal’s unspoken-of past reside among the pluff mud and jasmine of the ancestral Heyward home on the Bluff. This unknown legacy, now Merritt’s, will change and define her as she navigates her new life—a new life complicated by the arrival of her too young stepmother and ten-year-old half-brother.

Soon, in this house of strangers, Merritt is forced into unraveling the Heyward family past as she faces her own fears and finds the healing she needs in the salt air of the Low Country.

About the Author . . .

Karen White is the New York Times bestselling author of eighteen novels including A Long Time Gone, The Time Between, After the Rain, and Sea Change. She grew up in London but now lives with her husband and two children near Atlanta, Georgia.