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Libba
“Libby” Jane Delacourte has been away from Marshyhope Creek for too
many years.
It is finally time for her to go home and confront her past. Her mother
has had
a stroke and is not doing well, Libby is going to make amends for her
past and
hopefully stay awhile, in the home that she grew up in. However, she
has much
to contend with, both before she gets to her hometown and once that she
gets
there.
Her sixteen-year-old
daughter Chloe is dead set against leaving California, a state that she loves,
to finish
her education in the middle of nowhere. She is determined to fight her
mother,
tooth and nail, against this decision to move.
Her first
lover, Russ Hennessy is back in Marshyhope Creek as well.
Could fate be telling her something? The first
man that she ever loved, and who loved her, is divorced as well, and
willing to
start up again with Libby. Can they make a go of it the second time
around?
Moreover,
she has her parents to deal with. She ran out on them years ago, to
follow her
now ex-husband to California. Now she has to confront
the past
and make it right. That includes the secrets that her mother decides
that it is
time to tell. Secrets that rip everything that she thought were true
about her
mother to shreds. Secrets that could turn the small-town upside down
when they
are made public.
Libby has a
cause that she is fighting for on top of everything else as well. She
is trying
to learn why the seafood that is being caught from the Chesapeake is dangerously mutated.
What could
be in the water that is causing cancer, sickness, and deformed
children? Libby
has yearned to use her education in genetic mutation, and she finally
has her
chance. Will she learn what is upsetting the people of Marshyhope Creek
and be
able to help them?
CHESAPEAKE
TIDE is a well-written novel that addresses so many different issues
that it is
impossible to note them all. Ms. Baker has written about a family, the
Delacourte’s, which come to life between the pages and make the reader
fall in
love with them. I loved reading about their pasts, their indiscretions,
and
their presents. Libby and Russ have a second chance at the love that
they lost.
While Chloe forges the way for changes and the future of a small town,
she
refuses to let things lay dormant the way they have in the past. She is
a force
to be reckoned with, and a truly vivacious character to read about.
Nola Ruth,
Libby’s mother, is the true matriarch, Southern and delicate through
and
through, yet with an inner strength that has carried her through many
rough
decisions and changes.
I fell in
love with this small-town and the people that lived there. The
characters are
in depth and multi layered. The plot thickens with every page and keeps
the
readers interest, in spite of its many twists and turns. It was a
delight to
visit Marshyhope Creek in CHESAPEAKE TIDE -- it was an interesting and
thought
provoking trip.
Reviewed by
Ansley
Velarde for The Road to
Romance
August 9,
2004
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