Author: Dawn Tripp
Publisher: Random House
About the Book: Jane Weld was eleven years old when her father, Luce, disappeared in 1957. His skiff was found drifting near a marsh, empty except for his hunting coat and a box of shotgun shells. No one in their small New England town knew for sure what happened until, three years later, Luce's skull rolled out of a gravel pit, a bullet hole in the temple. Rumors sprang up that he had been murdered by the jealous husband of his mistress, Ada Varick.
Now, half a century later, Jane is still searching for the truth of her father's death, a mystery made more urgent by the unexpected romance that her willful daughter, Marne, has struck up with one of Ada's sons. As the love affair intensifies, Jane and Ada meet for their weekly Friday game of Scrabble, a pastime that soon transforms into a cat-and-mouse game of words long left unspoken, and dark secrets best left untold.
My thoughts: This was a very quick read and beautifully written. I like the way all the stories intertwined with these families. How Jane is now friends with the woman who was her father's mistress 50 years before - and her daughter and Ada's son are flirting with an attraction that is growing between them. The three women - Ada, Jane and Marne - play the larger roles in this story and while the men they love (or who love them) figure in to the story, it is the women who you learn the most about. While the story could not happen without them, these men seem sometime incidental. It gives the impression that life, love, family, history is all moved forward or sometimes stilted based on the women.
A lot of the story is learned as Ada and Jane play their weekly game of Scrabble. The words played or changed hint as to what lies in the past. As to the murder of Luce, it had never been solved, though the women each had their beliefs as to what happened. It isn't the only mystery/secret that is discovered through the course of the book though. One secret was obvious to me - the other was a secret until the end!
~I received a complimentary copy of this book from Sparkpoint Studio, LLC in exchange for my review.~
You can connect with Dawn at her website - Dawn Tripp or on Twitter.
Game of Secrets
Publisher/Publication Date: Random House, June 2012
ISBN: 978-0-8129-7148-4
272 pages
