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Author: Luanne Rice | Website
Published Works & Book Reviews
Secrets of Paris
Irresistible, long sought by readers, and now in paperback for the first time, Secrets of Paris shows New York Times bestselling author Luanne Rice at her most incandescent—a deeply moving story of true love, abiding friendship, and a once perfect marriage in precarious balance.
Lydie McBride has always embraced life to the fullest. But when an unthinkable tragedy strikes her family, everything she believes in is shattered. Her art-historian husband, Michael, watches the passion disappear from Lydie’s eyes and from their marriage, and hopes an assignment to Paris will help them reclaim a love that once seemed unassailable. But the City of Lights holds secrets and seductions for them both, including the mysteries of an alluring Frenchwoman with whom Michael will work. And Lydie’s unexpected friendship with two dramatically different women will enable her to find a new life. Will there be a place for the man with whom she always wanted to share that life . . . if she can find him again?
Reviewer: Mrs Brooks
Review: Feb 11, 2011
I liked the Americans-in-Paris story and especially how Lydie and Patrice became friends. I am not a fan of married people having affairs,but the one Michael and Anne have was OK ,the 'outcome' of Anne being pseudo- insane was intense. I also didn't care for the Kelly Merida-immigration story, I mean, was is just me or was that kind of dark...sad...and depressing? Especially since it didn't end on a positive
What Matters Most
New York Times bestselling author Luanne Rice works her singular magic in this deeply felt novel about two unforgettable couples, linked by a shared history, separated by decisions made long ago. ÿ What if you could relive one time in your life? What would you choose if you could make one thing right? For Bernadette and Tom, it is a return to their roots in Ireland and a love that broke every rule and could have withstood any consequence-but the one that broke their hearts. For James and Kathleen, whose indelible bond was forged in a Dublin orphanage before one was adopted and carried across the sea to America, it is a reunion they've dreamed of all their young lives, even if it defies reason. From the Emerald Isle to the Connecticut shore, four lives ÿare about to come together in a confrontation that will challenge each of them to leave behind the past and all they once thought was important, and to embrace at last what matters most.
Reviewer: Angibabi4
Review: Dec 1, 2010
This book is a love story that covers 2 separate generations. This is not realized until you get further along in the story. First you have James and Kathleen who in essence have grown up together. In the process they start the journey to young love, only for the journey to be interrupted, momentarily, and what obstacles they overcome to get back the love they had lost.
It also centers around the story of Be
The Deep Blue Sea for Beginners
A legendary island steeped in the mystery and wisdom of centuries…
A runaway heiress learning to trust life, and love…
A mother and daughter, separated for years, searching for a way to face the future together…
New York Times bestselling author Luanne Rice tells a powerful story of love, family, and friendship through the lives of two women who reunite at a place where dreams begin—and where they may be fulfilled at last….
Years ago, Lyra Davis left behind a world of wealth and privilege and the people she loved most in the world, unable to reconcile the expectations of her celebrated family with the longings of her own wild heart. Now she lives quietly among a community of expatriates on the isle of Capri, slowly, carefully learning to live fully for the first time, flourishing in the friendship of a singular man who recognizes in her a kindred spirit.
Granddaughter of the reigning doyenne of...
Reviewer: Roza
Review: Sep 3, 2009
The writing is a bit stiff at first. The dialogue didn’t quite ring true to my ears, and I had a hard time believing some of the internal monologue. Also, I never did figure out what was served by telling the story in third person for everyone except for Pell, who spoke to the reader several times. I’m not sure if Pell was writing in a diary or what. However, the writing sm
Last Kiss
New York Times bestselling author Luanne Rice returns to Hubbard’s Point, Connecticut, and to characters from her beloved Beach Girls, to tell the haunting story of a close-knit community grappling with a heartbreaking mystery, and of a woman rebuilding her world and reclaiming a love she believed lost a lifetime ago.
A face on a poster, a name in the news, an inexplicable tragedy. A promising young man goes out one warm summer evening and is found dead—murdered—less than twenty-four hours later. No motive. No clues. No answers. Most people reflect briefly on the disturbing headlines, perhaps say a silent prayer of safely removed sympathy, and go on with their lives. But what if the young man was your son? Or your true love?
Nearly a year after the death of eighteen-year-old Charlie, singer-songwriter Sheridan Rosslare still hasn’t played a note of the music that was once her life’s passion. Tucked away in the beach house where she raised her only child, she lives with her memories of him and a grief too big to share even with her beloved sisters or her dear friend Stevie Moore. Nor can Stevie comfort Charlie’s heartbroken girlfriend, Nell Kilvert, whom she regards as a daughter. Nell won’t rest until she finds out what really happened to the boy she loved. Out of the past she summons a man she believes cares enough, and is tough enough, to uncover the truth—Sheridan’s long-ago soul mate, Gavin Dawson.
Now Gavin’s boat, the Squire Toby, sits anchored in the harbor within sight of the window of the woman he once loved, still loves, and will always love. Sheridan,too, had once fervently believed in the miraculous power of love and healing, forgiveness, connection, and reconnection. But that faith died along with her son….
Unfolding among the Hubbard’s Point people and places that fans have come to treasure, and replete with feeling and mystery, Last Kiss weighs the power of the past to heal as well as wound, in a captivating tale of love, loss, and redemption that no reader will ever forget.
Reviewer: Terri
Review: Jun 20, 2009
Genre(s): Women's Fiction
Nell loves Charlie so much. They have made plans. Charlie is going to study film in NY and next year Nell will join him. Charlie is so talented. On August 31st, Charlie is found dead after attending a concert by Cumberland. Nine months later the police still don’t have a killer and Nell needs to find out what happened to her Charlie. She contacts Gavin Dawson, an inve
The Geometry of Sisters
What is one sister without the other? Is it even possible to imagine?
New York Times bestselling author Luanne Rice explores with the penetrating insight for which she’s acclaimed to explore the complex emotional equations of love and loyalty that hold together three pairs of remarkable sisters—a bond that proves powerful and true even in the face of loss and tragedy. Here in the halls of Newport Academy, a unique private school that has attracted generations of rebels, outcasts, and visionaries, a poignant and unforgettable lesson in the eternal truths of sisterhood is about to begin….
After years away, Maggie Shaw has returned to Newport to teach English at the academy. Behind her lies her life as the perfect midwestern wife and mother, a life that seemed on the surface to be all she had ever wished for. Ahead lie long-buried truths cracked open by the unfathomable loss of her husband and eldest daughter.
Newport has never failed to infuse Maggie with a sense of mystery, romance—and hope. But for fourteen-year-old Beck, the move is a painful upheaval from everything she has ever loved—especially her sister, Carrie. Ever since her father and sister disappeared into the storm-tossed waters off Mackinac Island, Beck has retreated into the world of mathematics, where principles are permanent, unlike so many other things in life. Without Carrie, Beck has lost half of herself—the half that would have fit in at the elite private school she and her brother, Travis, will now attend. The half that made things right. Still, Beck clings to the hope that her sister will return. For her body remains undiscovered—and only Beck knows about Carrie’s last day, about her plans.
Beck isn’t alone in her struggle to adjust. At sixteen, Travis is juggling a long-distance first love and an attraction to an expensive-looking girl with a wicked sparkle in her eye. And for Maggie, ghosts linger here—an unresolved breach with her own beloved sister and a long-ago secret that may now have the power to set her free….
Set against the breathtaking beauty of the New England coast at its most dramatic, populated by a cast of indelible characters, The Geometry of Sisters is Luanne Rice at her most compelling, a dazzling world to which readers will want to return again and again.
Reviewer: Terri
Review: Mar 18, 2009
It’s been a very rough year for the Shaw family. Their beloved husband and father drowned during the annual family vacation. The oldest daughter Carrie ran away immediately after the tragedy. Beck the youngest daughter began to steal things and isn’t coping well with the changes. Maggie, their mom, was forced to go into the work force for the first time. Travis the only so
The Letters
Is there any mystery greater than those we love the most?
In this remarkable collaboration, New York Times bestselling author Luanne Rice and Joseph Monninger combine their unique talents to create a powerfully moving novel of an estranged husband and wife through a series of searching, intimate letters. By way of a correspondence so achingly real you’ll forget it’s fiction, they trace the history of a love affair and of a family before, and after, the moment that changed the course of two people’s journey forever.
Sam and Hadley West are both trying in their own ways to survive after the unthinkable loss of their only son in Alaska. For Sam, a sports journalist, acceptance means an arduous trek by dogsled across the bleak and beautiful arctic wilderness to find the place where Paul died. For Hadley, it means renting a benignly haunted, salt-soaked cottage off the Maine coast where she begins to paint again.
Now, at opposite ends of the country, waiting for their divorce to be finalized, they begin to exchange letters by post, missives filled with longing and truths they’ve never before voiced, as they recall their marriage—its magic moments and its challenges—and begin to rediscover the reasons they fell in love in the first place.
As Sam risks his life to reach the remote crash site, Hadley begins an equally hazardous inner journey to a rendezvous with the mad grief of a mother’s heart. At the place where all else is lost, they will meet again….
Reviewer: Terri
Review: Dec 13, 2008
Sam and Hadley West are trying to deal with the death of their only child and son, Paul. Paul died in a plane crash in Alaska while on his way to teach in a remote Indian village. His death, instead of bringing Sam and Hadley closer, drove them apart to the point they are now looking to divorce. They have forgotten how to communicate.
Sam heads to Alaska to see where his son died. 
The Edge of Winter
New York Times bestselling author Luanne Rice takes us on a journey into the tender, unmapped territory that lies between mothers and daughters, and fathers and sons, in this mesmerizing new novel that travels into the past to find the key to a boundless future.
Reviewer: Terri
Review: May 8, 2008
This is a multi-generational book on relationships, love, grief and growing. It is set in South County, RI and most of the story pivots on Refuge Beach State Park.
Mickey Halloran is a high school student with a love of nature. One of her favorite hobbies is bird watching and when she finds out that a Snowy Owl is at Refuge Beach she gets her best friend to go see it even though it's Feb and really cold.
Reviewer: Rita
Review: Mar 17, 2008
Genre(s): Women's Fiction
Susannah Connolly finds herself at a crossroads in her life. Losing her mother to cancer was a hard blow. She takes a trip to France that they had planned to take together to see the famous white horses that live there and visit a church that they believe has ties to their family. Once she gets there she meets Grey Dempsey and his daughter Sari. Surrounded in the mystique of the area she finds herself drawn t
Sandcastles
Painter Honor Sullivan has made a life for herself and her three daughters–Regis, Agnes, and Cecilia–at Star of the Sea Academy on the magical Connecticut shore. Here she teaches art at the convent school’s beautiful seaside campus, over which Honor’s sister-in-law, mother superior Bernadette Ignatius, keeps a benevolent and watchful eye. No one could have foreseen the day rebellious Regis would come home with the stunning news that she was getting married. Nor could anyone have guessed how that sudden announcement would soon change all their lives forever. Eleven years ago, Honor thought she had the perfect home, the perfect love, the perfect life. Then her husband, brilliant photographer and sculptor John Sullivan, broke her heart–and tore their little family apart. Now, hearing of Regis’s impending marriage, John has ended his self-imposed exile and returned to the family he’s always loved more than anything on earth. What he finds is one daughter still hurting over his abandonment, another who barely remembers him, and a third who may be in more trouble than anyone knows. And then there is Honor herself–and a passion that may have been interrupted but that has never waned. Some things, like sandcastles, don’t survive the changing tides. But love, family, and friendship–just as fragile–have a way of standing against anything. It will take nothing short of a miracle to heal the rift between father and daughter, husband and wife, the past and the present–but a miracle is exactly what is in the works at Star of the Sea Academy. The only question is: Do you believe? From theHardcover edition.
Reviewer: Edie
Review: Oct 7, 2007
Set in Connecticut and Ireland, Sandcastles grabs the reader and holds on tight. Luanne Rice once again takes us on an emotional ride in this gripping family saga.
Painter Honor Sullivan and her husband John, a renowned photographer and sculptor, have created a wonderful life for themselves and their daughters. One stormy night in Ireland, on the edge of a cliff overlooking the sea, their perfect life is s
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