Monthly Archives: February 2009

by | February 27, 2009 · 9:53 am

Yvonne Lehman. By Love Acquitted. Uhrichsville, OH: Barbour Publishing, 2007.

In this novel a teenager’s bad choices have consequences for several people. After their parents die, Tyler Corbin assumes responsibility for his younger sister Penny.  Penny hides her grief in teenage rebellion.  She falls for Mr. Wrong, but when she attempts to break free of him, she takes off in a car that Mr. Wrong has stolen.  Tyler finds her after the car has crashed. He hides Penny’s involvement and goes to prison in her place.  As the novel opens, Tyler has just been released. On his first day of freedom, he meets Megan McKinney, a newcomer in town.  They are attracted to each other, but Tyler’s reluctance to be forthcoming about his past puts Megan on edge.  All of the main characters are churchgoers who struggle with issues of anger, guilt, and forgiveness. Through faith each is able to see what he or she must do.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2007, Lehman, Yvonne, Mountains, Religious/Inspirational, Romance/Relationship

by | · 9:38 am

Joyce Marie Taylor. Aniratak. New York: iUniverse, 2007.

Ocracoke Island is always a good setting for a story about loners, misfits, and star-crossed lovers.  In this book, Ocracoke is called Blackie’s Landing.  Andy McBride, a World War II veteran and former world traveler, retreated to Blackie’s Landing in the mid-1950s.  It’s now 1969.  Andy has made some friends on the island, especially young Bobby Ainsworth, but Andy is slipping into melancholy and heavy drinking.  When a fierce winter storm strands a mainland girl on the island, she takes refuge at Andy’s house. Andrea Bonelli is the best thing that has happened to Andy in a very long time.  She edits and types his memoirs, shakes him out of his self-pity, and shows him how he might regain the woman who was love of his life.  Bobby Ainsworth helps with this too, and in the end all the characters find the love and acceptance that they had been missing.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2007, Coast, Hyde, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Taylor, Joyce Marie

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by | February 26, 2009 · 4:56 pm

E. D. Arrington. Stay the Course. Bloomington, IN: AuthorHouse, 2004.

This fictionalized autobiography is a paean to the support that a loving mentor can provide.  The main character, Lori, is being raised by her grandparents.  Her grandmother offers guidance and stories of past racial injustices and recent improvements; all this helps Lori when she becomes one of the first African American students at a previously all-white high school.  Lori is smart and a good student, but she is not welcome and within the first year she is expelled.  The local African American community fights for her reinstatement.  Although the terms of her readmission are distasteful, Lori understands the lessons her Ma has taught her.  The novel focuses on Lori’s growth, but it also contains a warm, rich picture of her family and the African American community in a rural North Carolina county.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2004, Arrington, E. D., Coastal Plain, Novels Set in Fictional Places

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by | February 25, 2009 · 4:09 pm

Donna Campbell Smith. An Independent Spirit: The Tale of Betsy Dowdy and Black Bess. Buford, GA: Faithful Publishing, 2006.

An Independent Spirit is based on the Revolutionary War-era story of Betsy Dowdy, who rode to warn a North Carolina general about the approach of British soldiers from Virginia. This book presents the year leading up to her famous ride, with fourteen year-old Betsy living on Currituck Island, riding her wild pony Black Bess, and traveling to Edenton. Betsy’s quiet life is interrupted when Virginia’s Lord Dunmore threatens her community and her beloved wild ponies. Her all-night ride from Currituck to Hertford brings news of troop movements and leads to a patriot victory at the Battle of Great Bridge. This edition of the book includes a bibliography and teacher’s guide.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2006, Children & Young Adults, Chowan, Coast, Currituck, Docufiction, Historical, Smith, Donna Campbell

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by | February 23, 2009 · 9:47 am

Ann B. Ross. Miss Julia Throws a Wedding. New York: Viking, 2002.

When Hazel Marie decides to move out of Miss Julia’s house–and in with her boyfriend, J.D.–the proper widow isn’t sure what to do. Luckily, there are people in town who are more in the marrying mood and Julia throws herself into planning a proper wedding for a local couple. But nothing is ever easy in Abbotsville; there are bridal wedding jitters, uninvited guests, and a local thief for Julia to contend with. This is the third novel about Miss Julia’s exploits in the fictional town of Abbotsville.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library Catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2002, Henderson, Humor, Mountains, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Ross, Ann B.

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by | February 20, 2009 · 3:00 pm

Deborah Smith. The Stone Flower Garden. Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 2002.

This is a novel with some mighty strong women in it. Parts of the book are narrated by Darl Union, who at the start of the book is a young girl and sole heir to her family’s substantial fortune. Darl’s childhood relationship with Eli Wade and their later reunion drive the story forward, but the emotional center of the book resides with the women of an earlier generation–Darl’s grandmother, Swan Hardigee, Swan’s best friend, Matilda, and Darl’s great aunt, Clara. Clara’s arrival back in Burnt Stand, North Carolina, a town that Darl’s grandmother controls, precipitates twin tragedies that haunt Darl for the next twenty five years. Darl builds a life away from Burnt Stand as a successful defense attorney, but when she reunites with Eli she knows that she must return to her hometown and confront her family’s tangled past. Darl must discover if she has her ancestors’ strength without their heartlessness.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2002, Buncombe, Mountains, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Romance/Relationship, Smith, Deborah

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by | · 2:13 pm

Joan Medlicott. The Gardens of Covington. New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2001.

The “Ladies” have been living in Covington for just over a year and although they have settled into their home, they’re not so sure they are truly accepted by their neighbors. Each of the women faces her own trials, tribulations, and triumphs: Hannah works in her greenhouse and takes up an environmental cause, Grace opens a tearoom with her gentleman friend Bob (who wants to build a house on the ladies’ land), and Amelia works on her photography and falls for a mysterious man. The ladies also befriend the lonely and elderly Miss Lurina Masterson and face developers from Georgia who want to ruin their beloved Cove Road with a slew of new condominiums. This is the second book in Medlicott’s Covington series.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2001, Medlicott, Joan, Mountains, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places

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by | February 19, 2009 · 9:27 am

Joyce and Jim Lavene. Last Dance. New York: Avalon Books, 1999.

It definitely isn’t Stephen King, but the plot of Jim and Joyce Lavene’s Last Dance does feature a girl named Carrie whose prom experience is less than stellar. In fact, Carrie Sommers, prom queen of Diamond Springs High School, is murdered in the school’s parking lot. Sheriff Sharyn Howard believes that the case is similar enough to a prom-night murder that her father investigated 10 years ago that she reopens the old case. With the original murder suspect on death row, local and state politicians getting involved, and her mother worried about damage to her father’s reputation, Sharyn has her hands full in this book, the first of the Sharyn Howard Mysteries set in the fictional Uwharrie Mountain town of Diamond Springs.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library Catalog.

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Filed under 1990-1999, 1999, Lavene, Jim and Joyce, Montgomery, Mystery, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Piedmont

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by | February 17, 2009 · 1:27 pm

Toni L.P. Kelner. Down Home Murder. New York: Kensington Pub., 1993.

Laura Fleming left North Carolina years ago to attend MIT, but is summoned back to her western North Carolina hometown when her grandfather is badly injured in an accident at the town’s mill. But was her Paw’s “accident” really an attempt on his life? Laura (or Laurie Ann, as her family calls her) sees connections between his case and the murder of a local woman. Although she has her hands full investigating the incident, she also has to deal with a slew of her kooky relatives. This is the first of the Laura Fleming Mysteries, all of which are set in the fictional town of Byerly.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library Catalog.

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Filed under 1990-1999, 1993, Kelner, Toni L. P., Mountains, Mystery, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places

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by | February 16, 2009 · 11:13 am

Sallie Bissell. Call the Devil By His Oldest Name. New York: Bantam Dell, 2004.

Atlanta prosecutor Mary Crow is in the middle of a heart-wrenching child abuse/child pornography case when she is informed that her infant goddaughter has been abducted. The call sends her to a Cherokee gathering in Tennessee and into the woods after the perpetrator. The kidnapping is not a random event, but rather an attempt by Mary’s nemesis to lure her to her death. Although most of the novel is set on the Tennessee section of the Trail of Tears, Mary’s North Carolina hometown, the fictional Little Jump Off, makes an appearance.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2004, Bissell, Sallie, Mountains, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Suspense/Thriller

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