Julie's Review: Morning Glory

Summary: New York Times bestselling author Sarah Jio imagines life on Boat Street, a floating community on Seattle's Lake Union — home to people of artistic spirit who for decades protect the dark secret of one startling night in 1959. Fleeing an East Coast life marred by tragedy, Ada Santorini takes up residence on houseboat number seven on Boat Street. She discovers a trunk left behind by Penny Wentworth, a young newlywed who lived on the boat half a century earlier. Ada longs to know her predecessor's fate, but little suspects that Penny's mysterious past and her own clouded future are destined to converge. ~powells.com

 Review: Morning Glory is a wonderful story about how lives intersect and how hard it is to move on from a tragedy. The story alternates between Penny's story in 1959 and Ada's story in the present day. Both are connected by their time on the houseboat on Boat Street in Seattle. Penny is trying to begin a life with a moody but successful artist, Dexter Wentworth, who swept her off her feet.

Ada is running from a tragedy that took her husband and daughter away from her. In order to escape from her past, she runs to the furthest point from NYC, renting a houseboat. It is the houseboat and the mystery of Penny that helps heal her. It is also learning that she can love again and forgive herself that helps her move on as well.

Penny's story is one of finding what it means to be truly happy and to try to realize it before it's too late. It's not that Dex didn't love her, it's just that he though of her as another beautiful item he could own. It was too late when he did realize that perhaps he did truly love her.

What captured my heart was the description of the boathouse and the community. It is definitely some place that I would like to visit in the future. It seems to have a magic all it's own. All of the characters are interesting and are essential to both Penny and Ada's stories.

Ms. Jio has created something special with Morning Glory and to go into the details of the plot and characters would be to ruin it for you who haven't read it.


Final Take: 4.5/5


Morning Glory will be released on 11/26/2013


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