Here I am in week two of life in a rented beach house, smack on the beach in Westport, MA. Recently I had a psychic reading and the first thing the woman said was: You are water. You find comfort in it.
She was dead on! As a kid growing up in Rhode Island, my family spent our summers at Scarborough Beach, making daily treks there with various cousins and aunts, all crammed into a Chevy station wagon. The beach was Coppertone and root beer popsicles, body surfing and sandy peaches. It was heavenly. So I've spent that rest of my life thinking summer and ocean are the perfect combination. (Last summer Yankee Magazine ran my essay on the topic; www.yankeemagazine.com) Three years ago we decided to rent a house as close to the beach as possible, and landed here in this tiny town. For as many weeks as we spend here, I decompress: watch the waves crash over the rocks right out my bedroom window, grill dinner every night, invite family and friends to sit on the porch and drink wine with us, play with my kids, read lots of books, knit, and do jigsaw puzzles. Ah!

So, now that I'm catching up on all of my reading for pleasure, here's what I've read and loved:
Lee Woodruff's PERFECTLY IMPERFECT
Jayne Anne Phillips' LARK AND TERMITE
Jane Hamilton's LAURA RIDER'S MASTERPIECE
Julia Glass' I SEE YOU EVERYWHERE
Alice Hoffman's THE STORY SISTERS

These books are all so different and so wonderful. Reading Lee Woodruff's book is like having coffee with your good buddy. Jayne Anne Phillips' writing always challenges me to think and to feel in ways that I usually don't. Jane Hamilton's book is funny! A surprise and a delight. Julia Glass is a writer I just love for her characters and her stories. And Alice Hoffman has never written anything I don't love. She is amazing!

Next up: the new Kate Walbert and a first novel called COMMENCEMENT.

I always receive books for book jacket comments, and I feel guilty if I'm too bust to read them or if I don't really like them. So lucky me that Sorrel King's JOSIE'S STORY arrived right before I came to the beach, and I read it Day One. It isn't out yet, so you have to wait for it. And it isn't easy, but we have to tackle the tough stuff, don't we? Sorrel King's daughter Josie died from medical mistakes, and King tells about motherhood and loss in unflinching prose. She went on to create a foundation to help prevent this from happening to other children. Please read this book when you can.

Yesterday was Father's Day and we showered Lorne with Martini themed stuff. Also went to see Sam as Prince Charming in Sleeping Beauty in a musical fairy tale series. (he's also Papa Bear in Goldilocks and The Genie in Aladin) He looked so handsome up there, and his singing is so beautiful, that yes, Mom cried. Luckily he didn't notice! On Thursday he goes off to Honduras again to work with Sustainable Harvest International on a farm there. This is his third year making that trip.

I am embarrassed to admit that I am knitting more dish rags. But I love giving them to people and I will be off on the road for much of the summer--they are perfect thank you gifts, or Hey! I'm glad we met gifts!

Final revisions and line editing are finished on my new novel, THE RED THREAD. That has left me free to write some short stories and to think about a new novel. But honestly, right now it's mostly about watching those waves.