B
Genre: Contemporary Romance, Romance
This RITA® Reader Challenge 2015 review was written by PamG. This story was nominated for the RITA® in the Long Contemporary category.
The summary:
A mistake that’s meant to be…
All John Beauchamp wants is a simple life. He’s happy running his Louisiana sugar cane plantation and doesn’t want more than that. Then Shelby Mackey breezes in, announcing that she’s pregnant. Their one crazy night of passion has changed everything.
Except Shelby insists John doesn’t have to be involved—she’ll raise the baby herself. But John can’t let her go that easily. Even without the baby, Shelby is a breath of fresh air. Her call-it-as-she-sees-it attitude intrigues and attracts him. So when Shelby agrees to stay temporarily, John’s determined to make that stay permanent—and as sweet as can be.
Here is PamG's review:
I wanted to review Sweetest September because I’d read a couple of Liz Talley’s earlier works and enjoyed them. The novels I read were set in New Orleans and were both distinguished by a really strong sense of place. One of them, His Uptown Girl, also exhibited a level of risk-taking in the story-telling that I found both intriguing and original. Sweetest September turned out to be a totally different kettle of fish. That difference is not qualitative. It just is.
Sweetest September is based on a couple of the most familiar romance tropes, neither of which is a favorite of mine.
- First, it is a small town romance. Chick from big city on left coast finds herself in small Louisiana town and is gradually but thoroughly charmed.
- Second, the dominant plot device is an accidental pregnancy. I won’t say that I can’t ever tolerate this plot device, but mostly just knowing a prospective baby is driving the romance puts me off. I prefer the focus to be on the couple sans hostage to fate.
I know that either or both of these storylines are catnip for a lot of people, and I hope I’m able to convey the elements I genuinely liked about this book. I want to observe, first of all, that the story telling in Sweetest September is extremely linear. John and Shelby meet, drink, and fuck in a rural dive called Boots Grocery. We learn that Shelby has been painfully dumped and John is marking the one year anniversary of his wife’s accidental death.
Six weeks later, Shelby rolls back into town because she feels obligated to tell the baby daddy about his impending change of status. This upfront approach to problems is characteristic of the entire novel, and I found it very refreshing. Each act and each decision that Shelby and John make is practical and reasonable. At first the only thing that they have in common is a strong desire for this child; their growing interest in each other seems realistically gradual and credible. I found the chemistry somewhat muted, and when the relationship is consummated, the sex is urgent but not particularly raunchy. After the first time, it’s mostly kind of forgettable. Also, is anyone else tired of “liquid heat pooling low” in the belly, gut, abdomen, core?
John and Shelby are grownups. Neither character acted with the ultimate irresponsibility during their drunken one night five minute stand, though both will no doubt think twice about cheap hot pink condoms in future. Their situation is a mistake. Shelby considers abortion but is deterred by the sound of her baby’s heartbeat. Talley doesn’t ignore the options available to a woman in this situation nor does she lard this decision with a bunch of judgey generalities.
John’s immediate and reasonable response to the news is not all “yay!” but he asks the inevitable questions in a civil, non-douchey way. After John has adjusted to his new circumstances, he starts to search for ways to make the situation better for all of them.
“I want to be there for every part of your pregnancy. Neither of us planned this, but you don’t have to go through this alone. I can’t go to Seattle, but you can stay here. We can have this baby together.”
Shelby’s sunny personality makes a nice complement to John’s solid decency, though she uses humor and optimism to protect herself from the perceived rejections in her past. So while this baby trope is annoying and somewhat boring to me, I found myself really caring about serious John and upbeat Shelby. No, they didn’t give me all the feels, but they were realistic and likeable, and I appreciated that.
One aspect of this story that really resonated with me was the fact that John is a working farmer. Sometime back, there was some discussion on this site of why there weren’t more romances with farming backgrounds. Well, here ya go. John spends a lot of time dirty and tired, and the land he works is far from pretty and picturesque. Talley does not gussy up the brutal work of growing cane. Shelby enters a different world when she comes to Magnolia Bend and takes in John’s real life for the first time: “She’d never thought a farmer could look, well, sexy. But John Beauchamp had that going for him. . . not that she was interested.” That Shelby makes this observation in a mucky cane field kind of indicates her openness to new impressions and makes subsequent events more believable. Later on, John explains his reasons for what he does and this is a moment that absolutely grabs me.
“Yeah, but I love being out there, love the challenge of trying new things. Farming is a science and a gamble. There’s something about that I love.”
“So you’re a risk taker.” She smiled.
“Most people think of farming as simplistic and benign, but at heart a farmer is a rebel, shaking his fist against nature while secretly on his knees praying. I love what I do.”
This, right here, exactly expresses something true about farming. My dad retired after 30+ years as an electrician in Connecticut to raise blueberries in north Florida. John expresses my dad’s feelings about his second career exactly and that’s a big part of why I love this character in particular.
I have to say that the community of Magnolia Bend did not rise to the same level of realism or interest as its residents. While the ambience of a small southern town seems fairly authentic to my limited experience, Magnolia Bend and its residents lacked the level of detail that gives a reader a sense impression of people and place. I think Talley handled this much better in a couple of her books about New Orleans, and I think that the fact that it was New Orleans, a city of mega-personality, is not an adequate excuse to skimp on the unique qualities of a small town. Rural communities may have loads of atmosphere, but they sometimes seem boring to readers as well as to those who live in the real thing. The physical descriptions of Magnolia Bend are pretty much limited to one description of driving through town to the doctor’s office and of the annual Candy Cane festival. While the latter is the setting for an ah-ha moment for our main characters, I didn’t get any sense of the festival being a particularly fun or inspiring place to be. I understand that this ordinariness might be intentional, but it didn’t ring my chimes.
One thing I found interesting about this novel was the portrayal of a very Christian southern community. Except for the sexytimes, faith seems very central to this novel. What I liked was the acceptance of religion as a matter-of-fact part of community and personal life. When characters appeal to God, they really seem to be appealing to God. John is a preacher’s kid and the influence of his upbringing is obvious in his response to Shelby’s news. And that influence is clearly positive. His parents are balanced and likeable. To me, this is a good thing. Religion can be so divisive that I think a lot of authors try to ignore its role in people’s lives. I don’t think a small southern town like Magnolia Bend could be authentically portrayed without admitting the pervasive influence of religion. Talley doesn’t proselytize, but she ably describes ordinary individual practice of religion. What she doesn’t portray is a religiously (or any other kind of) diverse community. There does seem a little confusion as to the difference between Episcopal and Catholic schools. Though different religions are mentioned, they seem to be presented as part of a somewhat homogenized Christianity. Shelby has no obvious religious affiliation and her decisions are based on personal emotion and ethics until late in the novel when there is a small indicator of some sort of religious background. I suspect that the thread of religion winding through the story could be a make-or-break factor in some readers’ reactions to the novel.
The same fuzzy edges that dulled the depiction of Magnolia Bend seemed to afflict most of the secondary characters in Sweetest September. None of the characters seemed completely cardboard or one-dimensional, but their sole importance seemed to be their role in relation to John and Shelby. John’ s family is overpoweringly nice. I would have enjoyed seeing more of his parents and a lot more of his sister, Abigail and niece, Birdie.
The most negative characterization in the book is that of John’s former mother-in-law, Carla, who allows her abiding grief and loneliness to drive her to hatred of Shelby and severe bitchery towards John for daring to recover from his (her) loss. Carla is a major source of the novel’s conflict aside from the internalized emotional issues of the main characters, but Carla’s malevolence is almost turned on and off to build suspense. The reader is exposed to her hostility, but it seems a little out of context as one sees little of who Carla was before the appearance of Shelby in John’s life. Talley makes it very plain that Carla is aware of and acknowledges the cruelty of her treatment of John, yet chooses to act based on her own entrenched misery. It makes Carla stand out as an interesting character, but her actual role in the story is severely limited and ultimately irrelevant. The threat that Carla represents to Shelby and John’s HEA is resolved in an overly easy and unsatisfying way. It is the one element that seems very contrived, and it tends to obscure the main characters’ struggle to resolve their personal issues and commit to one another. Can’t say more because spoilers.
I think a major element that I enjoyed about Sweetest September, was the unpretentious, yet really solid writing. The narrative is smooth and well edited. Talley has a sly sense of humor that peppered my reading time with the occasional and much appreciated snort-laugh. Though Shelby, John’s mother, Fancy, and his relative, Hilda, all demonstrate high spirits, this story is not really heavy on banter between the central couple. What it does have are Karo flavored zingers sprinkled through the story. Talley is really the mistress of the well-placed simile. “All his good intentions of being a friend dissolved like a fart in the wind.” Yeah, it’s vulgar, but I laughed like a twelve year old boy. “So why was he studying her lips like they were chocolate and he had PMS?” Yup, laughed again. And then there were the metaphors. “He could have been a gherkin for all she knew.” Well placed humor is always a positive for me as long as it isn’t used to grind the characters down, so the author’s voice really worked for me
Overall, I’d recommend The Sweetest September to anyone who enjoys a mellow small town romance with likeable characters, mild quirky humor, and not a lot of angst. I’m choosing the B grade because the quality of the writing is good, and I have a soft spot for good writing and for the rural south.
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Great review. Really told a lot about what this book was like.
PamG. – really appreciated your thoughtful review. I’ve added the Sweetest September to my wish list as I enjoy stories set on farms, which is not often done, and find books with simple faith wove through them soothing.
Someone else also recently reviewed this book and I think yours is a good contrast to that one. I also enjoyed this book and I agree with both reviewers, Carla is necessary for the drama but is the least developed character. I felt the author perhaps has no personal experience of the kind of loss she was writing about and should have done some research to make Carla more real and believeable.
I found Birdie completely entrancing, that little minx, and look forward to getting to know her better.
Hmm. I was the other reviewer and I thought our two reviews are actually quite similar, at least in sentiment, though obviously different aspects of the book stuck with me more than they did with this reviewer — which is only to be expected. So don’t quite understand the “good contrast” comment… Ultimately, we gave the book the same grade.
But no matter, I thought this was a great review. I like Liz Talley’s writing. It might be interesting to see what she could do in a longer format.
I apologize. I did not mean to offend you. By “good contrast” I simply meant you each focused on different aspects of the novel.
Not offended at all. Just confused. And of course, it’s totally possible that what I wrote came across differently from the way I intended it to come across.
As, I think, did what I wrote.