Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781481255790 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | CreateSpace Publishing |
| Publication date: | 01/10/2013 |
| Pages: | 364 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.81(d) |
About the Author
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
Trails in the Sand
5 out of 5
based on
0 ratings.
4 reviews.
 |
I loved this book so much. Drama, drama, drama. The cast of characters were rich. The story lines (yes, there were two) were interesting. One is the tale of a family with too many dark secrets, a family that needed to heal. Slowly, the author revealed the horrific family past, which kept me turning the pages. The Gladys Kravitz in me couldn't wait to learn about all their dirt. The optimist in me wanted to see they would all be all right in the end. It's heart-wrenching. It's hopeful. Bravo!
|
|
“Trails In The Sand” by P.C. Zick is an emotional read about family secrets and making peace with the past. After her sister dies, Caroline reconnects with her family and with Simon, the man that her sister stole from her and married. Said widower Simon has an adopted daughter that needs to come to terms with her status and with the new relationship between her aunt and her father. Thrown into the mix are a few more family issues such as a drowning in 1956 and more revelations that come from diaries. As you can see that there are a lot of issues to be resolved in this family, making it an emotionally charged scene.
Zick uses several separate narratives for this story to bring different perspectives into the book and also includes several sub plots making for a rich reading experience. There is an important plotline which concerns the 2010 Deepwater Oil Spillage in the Mexican Gulf, a metaphor for hidden or covered-up tragedies and wrong doings that ultimately force their way to the surface and spill onto the shore. Caroline being a writer and journalist that concerns herself with environmental issues – not just the oil spillage – describes the horrific damage to the wildlife and the coast. She also writes also about a coal mining disaster in Virginia which helps to take the focus of just one or the other oversight or cover-up making it a more global theme. The family is under severe stress from both external and internal forces and as they unite to save sea turtles and work together on the present they let go of the past and begin to forgive and to heal.
The writing in this novel is immaculate and tight; for example, the Prologue begins in 1956 with the drowning of Alex, Caroline’s uncle, and the story ends in the same spot, a beautifully chosen way to complete the circle. The dialogue and the weaving together of the various plots and narratives works well to unfold the story and make this an interesting read. The characters are well composed and believable and make for an engaging and convincing portrayal of their inner struggles.
Zick writes with much empathy and insight into her characters, showing a very caring and committed attitude towards the environment and the human beings in it. The interplay between the story lines, private lives and newspaper stories that are woven into the narrative adds much depth to the book.
|
|
Trails in the Sand is Southern drama on the scale of Anne Rivers Siddons, where family secrets lie as deep as a mangrove swamp, skeletons molder in the woodwork, and the honeyed smiles of Southern belles mask seething resentment.
Everyone in the Carlisle/Stokely family hides secrets behind a veneer of Southern respectability. Hatred runs deep and across generational lines. Caroline, the protag, is a journalist who left her family determined to never return. She had been betrayed by her sister who married the love of Caroline's life, the hapless Simon. She tried alternative living, married twice, and traveled to far away places, but she could not escape the gravitational pull of her family, and Simon.
Late in life, Caroline grabs a chance at happiness by marrying Simon after her sister passes away. This unleashes a family feud and the estrangement of Simon's daughter [who is adopted and whose story emerges as yet another link in the chain of secrets]. While investigating the BP oil well disaster, Caroline comes across her mother's journals as well as those of her uncle Alex and her grandfather, the infamous Arthur Stokely.
Shock and awe doesn't begin to describe what she discovers--murder, incest, secret pregnancies with roots back to England. So how do Caroline, Simon, and the daughter heal from these revelations? They work together on the rescue of sea turtles. These activities melt the ice around their hearts and pave the way to a chance at reconciliation.
Forgiveness without judgment and condemnation is the key. While a lot of what happened is not understandable or even excusable, at the end, the survivors must put an end to bitterness and make a commitment to use love to heal their wounds.
The backdrop of the BP oil well blowout and the Massey mine accident serves to show how these events affected people and wildlife. The tragedy is the emphasis on coverup and denial by officials without concern for the lives affected.
None of the investigations mentioned the forty men whose lives were lost during these so-called blameless events. They also failed to mention the families left behind still struggling with their loss and the wildlife fighting for their lives in oil-filled waters.
Zick, P.C. (2012-12-12). Trails in the Sand (p. 365). In the Garden Publishing. Kindle Edition.
The final message is worth remembering and applying in our lives.
"Who knows what anyone's motives are?" Holly asked. "I've learned one thing during my life. We are unable to judge other people unless we've walked their very same path.
Zick, P.C. (2012-12-12). Trails in the Sand (p. 390). In the Garden Publishing. Kindle Edition.
I am very glad I read this book. It made me appreciate the efforts that went into the cleanup of the BP oilwell disaster and the dedication of volunteers to save little lives [those of the sea turtle hatchlings] as well as the people fighting for mine safety. Unfortunately, we as a society tend forget between news stories. But if it is personalized, like this novel has done, it is not as easily forgotten.
|
|
Set on Florida's panhandle and the east coast near St. Augustine, the second novel in the Florida Fiction series, Trails in the sand, presents Caroline, a woman faced with challenges on two levels: her family and her environment. On the family level, she uncovers family secrets--murder, incest, and pregnancies—secrets that went unspoken for as long as three generations back. Going forward, these secrets threaten to unsettle the shaky balance between her, her husband, and his daughter, as they struggle to reach for each other and find forgiveness. On the environment level, they must pull their efforts together, to rescue sea turtles that are threatened by extinction due to environmental hazards brought on by society. In Zick’s writing, the family and environment issue are interconnected: the night scene on a beach near Cape Canaveral, when the sea turtle hatchlings make their way to the sea, is moving on both levels at once. It left trails in the sand, in a direction which for me, evoked hope for a future founded on understanding and acceptance.
Five stars.
|
Explore More Items
