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Title: Sunshine and Shadow (Benni Harper Mystery) by Earlene Fowler ISBN: 0-425-18855-8 Publisher: Prime Crime Pub. Date: 06 May, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $22.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.83 (12 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: An excellent series
Comment: Earlene Fowler can be depended on for a good story with interesting characters, and the beautiful background of the central California coast. In this, the 10th. book of the series, she tells parallel stories of heroine Benni Harper. One of the stories takes place in 1978 when Benni is married to young rancher, Jack Harper, and the second relates incidents in 1995 when Benni is married to Gabe, the local chief of police. Prominent in both stories is Emma Baldwin, an author whom Benni had admired in her younger days, and whom she interviewed for
a paper when she was in college. Another character is Luke, a friend of Gabe's whom he used to work with and who is back in town to visit. Fowler carefully weaves these stories together, much like a quilt pattern, and emerges with a well-told tale which has unsuspected connections at the end.
Rating: 5
Summary: --Yesterday and Today--
Comment: SUNSHINE AND SHADOW is a little different from the other books in this series. Earlene Fowler takes us back into Benni's early life and her first marriage to Jack. The author switches gears often and intertwines some of the story of Benni and her life with Jack with what's going on today in Benni's life. This is the tenth book in this series and there are many parts that make up SUNSHINE AND SHADOW.
The story begins when grandmother Dove marries Isaac. Her new husband moves in with lots of stuff and Dove asks Benni to take back the boxes that she had stored at her grandmother's home. Many of the items are things that had belonged to Benni's first husband, and they lead to Benni's reminiscing about Jack who was killed in an accident. As she sorts through the material, she comes across a journal that Jack had kept and she receives a startling revelation.
Emma Baldwin, an old acquaintance and famous author returns to San Celina and she and Bennie resume their friendship. She also agrees to lend Benni a wonderful old crazy quilt to display in the folk art museum where Benni is the curator.
Gabe Ortiz, Benni's husband who also happens to be the local police chief, continues to be devoted to his new wife, but the marriage is still a little shaky. The mystery comes into the story when an old friend of Gabe's from the LAPD is killed in San Celina. After that, someone starts harassing Benni, and Gabe is convinced it has to do with an incident from his own past when he was a drug enforcement officer.
I was really looking forward to reading SUNSHINE AND SHADOW, but it was not what I was expecting. STEPS TO THE ALTAR, the previous story in this series, left me in a state of uncertainty as to what would happen to Benni's marriage to Gabe and I approached this book expecting a resolution to that problem. At first I felt that this story skirted that issue; however, the more I thought about this book, the more I realized that the author knows that a troubled marriage is not cured overnight. I believe that she decided to give her characters time to work through their marital problems. After all, everyone's life is filled with sunshine and shadow.
As usual, this author delivers another good book and tops it off by giving the reader something to think about. This is a skillfully written and very clever story.
Rating: 5
Summary: A Really Good Book
Comment: In _Sunshine and Shadow_ Earlene Fowler has done something very difficult: taken two interlocking stories set seventeen years apart and told them in a way that each illuminates both the other and the underlying theme of the novel, bringing the two together at the end for a touching conclusion. The skill with which she pulls this feat off alone makes me give this book high marks. That there are other things to like here is frosting on the cake.
As San Celina prepares for its annual Fiesta Days, both Benni and her husband, Gabe, renew acquaintances with friends from their pasts. When one is murdered and Benni finds herself victimized by a mysterious stalker, Benni and Gabe are forced to remember and confront things they'd rather forget.
_Sunshine and Shadow_ is less a mystery than an exploration of characters and relationships, and the ways events in the past influence the present, both for good and bad. The murder story is more of a device in service to this theme than an end in itself, but I didn't feel cheated. I actually found it refreshing that Ms. Fowler chose to go in a very different direction and treat her characters in very different ways, instead of limiting herself to the same old "Benni is a snoop but it works out okay in the end" story. We see a very different Benni here, one who is forced to face fear and questions of faith in order to find her real strength.
There are a couple of glitches -- noticably that the Internet and cell phones are more prevalent in the world of the book than they really were in 1995 -- but none that detract from the excellence of the storytelling. _Sunshine and Shadow_ is a strong and sensitive addition to the Benni Harper series, one that made me think about it long after the reading was done.
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Title: Steps to the Altar (Benni Harper Mystery) by Earlene Fowler ISBN: 0425189449 Publisher: Prime Crime Pub. Date: 01 April, 2003 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: The Quilter's Legacy : An Elm Creek Quilts Novel by Jennifer Chiaverini ISBN: 0743236130 Publisher: Simon & Schuster Pub. Date: 08 April, 2003 List Price(USD): $22.00 |
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Title: Arkansas Traveler (Benni Harper Mystery) by Earlene Fowler ISBN: 0425184285 Publisher: Prime Crime Pub. Date: 02 April, 2002 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Seven Sisters by Earlene Fowler ISBN: 0425179176 Publisher: Prime Crime Pub. Date: 10 April, 2001 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Dove in the Window (Benni Harper Mystery) by Earlene Fowler ISBN: 0425168948 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: May, 1999 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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