The Last Summer of Her Other Life
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4.0 • 9 Ratings
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
From Jean Reynolds Page—the critically acclaimed author of The Space Between Before and After and one of the most compelling voices in contemporary women's fiction—comes a dazzling novel of loss and redemption, of relationships that damage and those that heal.
Thirty-nine and pregnant by a man she's decided to leave behind in California, Jules' life is changing. Always the protected daughter, she must now relinquish that role and prepare to be a mother herself. But her efforts are upstaged by shocking allegations from a local teen in her North Carolina hometown. The boy has accused her of what the police are calling “inappropriate sexual contact.” Three men rally in her defense: Lincoln, her brother, who flies in from New York to help her; Sam, her high school boyfriend, who after so many years still offers unconditional support; and Walt, the uncle of the teen, who charms Jules with his intelligence and unanticipated kindness.
Her search for the truth about the troubled teenager becomes, for Jules, a first step toward discovering the woman she wishes to be. But with so many wrong choices behind her, how can she trust herself with the future of her unborn child?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Jules Fuller, the unsinkable protagonist of Page's pleasant if heavy-handed novel, thought she'd left her North Carolina childhood far behind when she moved to California and found work in the movie business. But when her mother falls ill, she's pulled east, pregnant at age 39 by an ex-boyfriend. Soon, her mother dies, and Jules stays at home, speaking to the high school drama class and trying to figure out what kind of mother she might make. But then Vick, a troubled teenage boy, accuses her of molesting him, and Jules's meditative seclusion becomes a quest to clear her name. As Jules faces the charges against her and tries to unravel Vick's troubled past, she finds her own path to motherhood more tangled than ever. Though the plot has a few unlikely turns, Page's knack for characterization brings it back down to earth and helps nudge things toward an appropriately affirmative ending.
