CANR
WORK TITLE: Big Lies in a Small Town
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://www.dianechamberlain.com/
CITY: Raleigh
STATE:
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
LAST VOLUME: CANR 314
http://www.panmacmillan.com/book/dianechamberlain/necessarylies
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born March 18, 1950, in Plainfield, NJ; daughter of John and Nan Lopresti; married Richard D. Chmielewski, April 14, 1973 (divorced, 1993); married David Heagy, June 8, 1996; children: (stepchildren) Brittany Walls, Alana Glaves, Caitlin Heagy.
EDUCATION:Attended Glassboro State College, 1968-70; San Diego State University, B.A., 1975, M.S.W., 1978.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Sharp Memorial Hospital, San Diego, CA, social worker, 1980-83; Children’s Hospital, Washington, DC, social worker, 1983-85, clinical social worker, Alexandria, VA, 1985-92; novelist, 1987—.
AVOCATIONS:Dog training, travel, photography, music.
MEMBER:Novelists Inc. (membership chair), Romance Writers of America.
AWARDS:RITA Award, Romance Writers of America, 1990, for novel Private Relations; Lifetime Achievement Award, Romantic Times, 1997, 2001.
RELIGION: Unitarian Universalist.WRITINGS
Contributor of articles to newspapers and magazines.
SIDELIGHTS
Award-winning author Diane Chamberlain has been quite prolific since becoming a full-time writer in 1992. Chamberlain described her work on her home page: “My stories are often filled with twists and surprises and—I hope—they also tug at the emotions. Relationships—between men and women, parents and children, sisters and brothers—are always the primary focus of my books.”
Chamberlain once told CA: “I have been fortunate to have had two rewarding careers, as a clinical social worker and now as a novelist. Both careers have been challenging and have allowed me to touch the lives of others in a positive way. Being a psychotherapist has given me psychological insights into people, which has enabled me to create realistic, multidimensional characters.”
Chamberlain’s third published book, Secret Lives, is a “many-layered novel,” as Sybil Steinberg described it in Publishers Weekly. It features a strong woman at the center, actress Eden Riley, who comes back to her childhood home to film the story of her mother, an elusive writer who died when Eden was only eleven. Eden’s search into the past is accompanied by a new relationship for the actress in the present, in this “brisk, atmospherically evocative narrative,” as Steinberg noted. Secret Lives was followed by Keeper of the Light, in which a threatened lighthouse beloved by a deceased woman, Annie O’Neill, is saved by members of her surviving family as well as a female surgeon, Dr. Olivia Simon, who had been unable to save Annie’s life, and Simon’s husband, who had been romantically obsessed with Annie.
Valle Rosa, a drought-afflicted community in Southern California, is the setting for Chamberlain’s next novel, Fire and Rain, a tale of a mysterious stranger who claims to have rainmaking skills and strangely affects the lives of several of the town’s citizens. A reviewer for Publishers Weekly noted that “nearly every chapter finishes with the sort of emotional jolt that keeps the pages turning.”
With the 1997 novel The Escape Artist, Chamberlain tells a tale of a woman who creates a new life with her young son to avoid losing him to her ex-husband in a custody battle. However, she is jolted back into her real identity when her sense of civic duty intrudes. While a reviewer for Publishers Weekly found this book a “fairly pedestrian affair,” a more positive assessment came from Booklist contributor Michele Leber, who called it a “page-turner” with “an eminently satisfying ending.”
The theme of secrets from the past intruding upon the present reappears in Breaking the Silence, a work that “offers relentless suspense and intriguing psychological insight,” according to a Publishers Weekly contributor. Similarly, in Summer’s Child, Chamberlain plumbs the secrets and mysteries of the past while engaging her characters in a present-day romance. A reviewer for Publishers Weekly commended Chamberlain for producing “a captivating tale populated with haunting characters.”
Chamberlain turned to the thriller format for her 2001 novel, The Courage Tree, the story of a divorced woman whose efforts to find an alternative cure for her daughter’s kidney complaint are so successful that the youngster is able to accompany her Brownie troop on a hike. When the girl becomes lost in the woods and officials lose hope of finding her, the mother must locate the child before time runs out and renal failure occurs. Booklist contributor Diana Tixier Herald commended the work as a “memorable thriller,” while similar praise came from a Publishers Weekly reviewer who called it a “page turner [that] will please those who like their stories with as many twists and turns as a mountain road.”
Chamberlain blended a story of healing with a complex tale of a romantic triangle in Cypress Point. Driven by guilt feelings for having had an affair with her best friend’s husband, Joelle turns to a healer from her youth to try to make amends. A contributor to Publishers Weekly found this a “humane but too-familiar novel.” A more positive assessment came from Booklist contributor Patty Engelmann, who thought Chamberlain’s “complicated novel will bring tears to her readers, but they won’t regret the experience.”
North Carolina’s Outer Banks is the setting for a pair of novels from Chamberlain. In Kiss River, she presents the alternating tales of a teenager living during World War II and a contemporary story of a teacher, Gina, who is pursuing a “mysterious quest,” as Herald described it in Booklist.
Kiss River introduces the brother and sister characters Clay and Lacey, and it is Lacey who is the focus for Her Mother’s Shadow. A reviewer for Publishers Weekly observed that “complex, credible characterization raises her saga so far above soap opera.” Herald, writing in Booklist, also praised Her Mother’s Shadow, calling it a “compelling women’s novel.”
Chamberlain presents a story full of family secrets and a mystery long unsolved in her 2005 novel, The Bay at Midnight, a “smooth, deceptively simple tale of romantic suspense,” according to a Publishers Weekly reviewer. Similar praise came from Booklist contributor Kristine Huntley, who called the novel “both an enticing mystery and a rewarding love story.”
In 2006, Chamberlain published The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes, which in 2009 was reprinted under the title The Lost Daughter. The story centers on Eve Elliott, who more than twenty years before had been known as CeeCee Wilkes, a waitress who had become enamored with a dashing college student, Tim Gleason. As CeeCee, she had agreed to become involved in a kidnapping that he and his brother were plotting. When the kidnapping went awry and ended in the inadvertent death of a new mother named Genevieve Russell, Tim and his brother disappeared, leaving CeeCee to pick up the pieces. This meant taking on a new identity as Eve and raising Russell’s newborn daughter, Corinne. More than twenty years later, Russell’s body has finally been found—without her baby. The question of what happened to the child becomes central to the story. The case becomes public, and Tim, who abandoned Eve two decades ago, is charged with murder. He is subsequently convicted and faces the death penalty. Eve is the only person besides Tim who knows the truth—that he did not kill the woman or her child. She knows she can save him, but that presents a dilemma. If she comes forward and saves Tim, she will destroy the only family that she has ever really known.
Wendy Knowles, writing in Trashionista, commented that “this is not a light, fun holiday read but I would highly recommend it. It is powerful and moving and raises issues about living with the consequences of decisions we make when we are young and foolish and in love.”
In Before the Storm, which was published in 2008, Laurel Lockwood, a nurse, keeps a close eye on her fifteen-year-old son, Andy, who suffers from fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. She feels guilty about his illness as well as her own overly protective nature. She allows him to attend a dance party held at their church. A fire breaks out during the party, and Andy saves several lives, which afterward makes his mother very proud of him. But soon a witness comes forward and claims to have seen Andy outside the church just before the fire broke out, which makes him an arson suspect. This potentially damaging revelation threatens to destroy the positive impact of Andy’s deeds on his relationship with his mother.
A contributor to the Crazy for Books website wrote: “The author captures the essence of each character through a riveting and thought-provoking narrative.” Harriet Klausner asserted on Genre Go Round Reviews: “With a plausible critical spin Before the Storm is a fascinating tale.” Diana Risso, writing in Romance Reviews Today, noted: “It is often difficult to read about Andy and his affliction, as well as the catastrophic facts of this preventable disability that lend a dark realism to the pages. Before the Storm is a moving tale of one family’s struggle to survive their mistakes and makes for a poignant read.” Patty Engelmann, a Booklist contributor, stated that “Chamberlain’s heartbreaking tale frankly and sensitively explores postpartum depression and the toll it takes on families.”
Chamberlain followed Before the Storm with Secrets She Left Behind. This story picks up where the previous book left off, but Chamberlain told a Romance Book Club interviewer that she wrote the book to stand alone. “It’s not necessary to read Before the Storm first. However, I’m confident that people who’ve already read Before the Storm will be fascinated to learn what happens to those characters next.” Secrets She Left Behind is about a seventeen-year-old boy named Keith who was badly burned in the fire that occurred in Before the Storm. Keith’s anger toward the world causes him to push away everyone except his mother, Sara. He is dependent on his mother in every way imaginable, and then she disappears, leaving behind a diary of secrets. His older half-sister, Maggie (they both have the same father), is being released from prison after serving a year for her part in the fire, and his younger brother, Andy, who saved many lives from during the fire, attempts to be there for his siblings as well. As the three transition into a relationship with each other and struggle with life in general, the importance of a question that has been placed on the back burner rises to importance: What has happened to Sara?
Harriet Klausner observed on the Genre Go Round Reviews website that “the story line retains the fascination of the first book as readers see closely the sibling rivalries from rotating first-person perspectives and Sara’s journal.” Clair Orphan, writing in Booklist, thought the “alternating narratives allow plenty of insights into the characters’ motives while creating intrigue and suspense.” A contributor to the Crazy for Books website noted: “It was a really intriguing way of telling the story and it worked really well in these books.” And Jeri Neal, writing for the Romance Readers Connection website, offered these words of praise: “It is compassionate without being sappy and tells a wonderful story that spans back several years. This is the best Diane Chamberlain novel I have read to date. Her experience as a social worker makes every part believable and clear.”
Chamberlain’s 2010 novel, The Lies We Told, features sisters who are also physicians. Rebecca and Maya Ward lived through a devastating trauma, witnessing their parents’ murder when they were teenagers. Rebecca managed to save Maya from the attacker, and now as adults Rebecca is still the one willing to take risks while Maya is the cautious one. Maya is tested, however, with a destructive hurricane striking the North Carolina coast. Rebecca talks her sister into helping with the relief efforts, but when the helicopter Maya is riding in goes down in flood waters, it is assumed she, along with the other on board, died. In fact, Maya is injured and is now miles from help and amid backwoods strangers whom she is not sure she can trust. Now Maya must find the courage to finally overcome her fears.
Library Journal contributor Julie Kane was not impressed with this offering, noting that “although Chamberlain deals with family issues, the complexity is lacking here, and the plot twists are predictable.” Similarly, a Publishers Weekly reviewer thought that “Maya’s improbable backwoods adventure and its unlikely outcome lead to a feel-sort-of-good resolution that doesn’t ring true.” Reviewing The Lies We Told in Booklist, Claire Orphan had a higher assessment, remarking that “Chamberlain weaves an intensely engaging story.”
In The Midwife’s Confession, Chamberlain relates a “complex, heart-wrenching tale,” according to Booklist critic Julie Trevelyan. Three college friends—Tara, Emerson, and Noelle—have gone their separate ways as adults, but have stayed in touch. Now Tara and Emerson both have daughters, and Noelle has become a midwife. Tara and Emerson are stunned by Noelle’s suicide and begin to put together the real story of her life, one that they were never aware of. The two discover an unfinished letter among the dead woman’s belongings that opens the door to a dark secret from Noelle’s past and to discoveries about her that make Tara and Emerson wonder if they ever really knew their friend. The story is told from several perspectives and time periods.
A Publishers Weekly reviewer called The Midwife’s Confession a “heartbreaking mystery,” but also felt that “the hopping back and forth between characters creates a narrative jumble.” Trevelyan, however, had no such concerns, noting that “Chamberlain weaves backstory and front story with skill and tender ferocity.” Similarly, an online Books in the City contributor felt that “Chamberlain expertly weaves it all together and I never felt lost as I read the book,” while a reviewer for Rundpinne website noted: “Chamberlain’s character descriptions make these women very real, flawed, and believable, all marks of a master storyteller.”
Travis Brown is a well-meaning single dad in Chamberlain’s 2012 novel The Good Father. Travis, twenty-three, has been raising his daughter, Bella, on his own since he was nineteen. His buddies are out at late-night parties, but Travis has focused on the welfare of his child. He has built a relatively secure life for them as he works construction. But then his home burns down, killing Travis’s mother, and Travis loses his construction job. Desperate, he travels to Raleigh, North Carolina, on a flimsy promise of work. The work turns out to be criminal activity, but Travis wonders if he can turn it down. Now his life intertwines with two others: Robin, who is Bella’s mother and was forced by her father to give up Travis and her child; and Erin, who has just lost her only child and is still reeling from the emotional devastation.
“Chamberlain’s keen grasp of regret and grief makes for a surprisingly thoughtful and compelling tale,” noted a Publishers Weekly reviewer. Similarly, online RT Book Reviews contributor Sarah Eisenbraun termed The Good Father a “heart-wrenching story about lost loves and the risks people take to save those they deeply care about.”
In Necessary Lies, Chamberlain takes readers back half a century to rural Grace County, North Carolina, during an epoch that witnessed not only racism but also a state-enforced sterilization program that operated between 1929 and 1975, sterilizing thousands of women and men. Such a program was aimed at the mentally ill, people with disabilities, women on welfare, and African Americans. The story focuses on fifteen-year-old Ivy Hart, who is struggling to keep what is left of her family together on a small tobacco farm. Among the family is her diabetic grandmother, her mentally challenged sister, and her sister’s baby. Things are not made any easier for Ivy with her own medical condition, for she suffers from epilepsy. Jane Forrester, meanwhile, has—against the wishes of her husband, a physician—taken a position as social worker in Grace County, with the Harts as her primary case. Jane is amazed to discover that case workers are required to begin sterilization proceedings on people who fit the categories, and when Ivy is threatened with the procedure, Jane must now decide between her career and what she thinks best for the young girl.
“Chamberlain certainly knows how to escalate tension,” wrote a Kirkus Reviews critic of Necessary Lies. The critic went on to call the book “socially conscious melodrama at its best.” Writing in Library Journal, Lesa Holstine felt that “Chamberlain brings to light the horrors inflicted for years on victims of the eugenics sterilization program.” Similarly, a Publishers Weekly reviewer thought that Chamberlain’s novel “digs deep into the moral complexity of a dark period in history and brings it to life.” Further praise for Necessary Lies came from Booklist contributor Julie Trevelyan, who called it “absorbing and haunting.”
The Silent Sister is a family melodrama set in motion when Riley MacPherson, a school guidance counselor, travels to North Carolina to settle the estate of her recently deceased father, Frank. Years earlier, Riley had an older sister, Lisa, a violin prodigy who mysteriously disappeared while kayaking on the Potomac River near the Virginia home the family occupied at the time. Her body was never discovered, but all evidence pointed to a death by drowning; Riley and her brother, Danny, were told that Lisa had been depressed and committed suicide. Twenty-three years later, as Riley is preparing the sale of her father’s real estate—the family home and a nearby trailer park—she begins to unravel secrets about her family. Danny is an Iraq War veteran struggling with psychological issues; Frank was paying off a friend, Tom, as if he were being blackmailed; yet another family friend, Jeannie, appears to be hiding something. Ultimately, the reader learns that Lisa had been charged with the murder of her music teacher. As she was about to go to trial, Frank and Tom, both of whom were U.S. marshals, faked her suicide and relocated her to the other side of the country, where she has been finding it difficult to remain out of sight by avoiding music.
Reviewers greeted The Silent Sister with high praise. A reviewer for the Laurie Here Web site called Chamberlain a “masterful story teller.” A Kirkus Reviews contributor remarked: “Although the plot is not exactly watertight, the revelations are parceled out so skillfully that disbelief remains suspended until the satisfying if not entirely plausible close.” The reviewer concluded by calling the novel “a compulsively readable melodrama.” For Library Journal contributor Brooke Bolton, “Chamberlain’s powerful story is a page-turner to the very end.” Stephanie Turza, in a review for Booklist, found the novel to be “powerful and thrilling” as well as “tautly paced and emotionally driven.”
The protagonist and narrator of Pretending to Dance is Molly Arnette, the thirty-eight-year-old lawyer living in San Diego. Molly and her husband, Aidan, are in the process of arranging an open adoption with a girl named Sienna, who is having reservations about giving up the baby. Molly, for her part, is frightened that background checks will reveal secrets she would just as soon Aidan did not know. Molly has led her husband to believe that both of her parents are dead, but Nora, Molly’s mother, is alive. Molly has broken off all relations with Nora because Nora killed her father, a psychologist who was confined to a wheelchair because of multiple sclerosis and who developed a form of therapy for troubled adolescents that Molly calls “Pretend Therapy.” The novel flashes back to a summer in North Carolina when Molly was fourteen years old. Living in a nearby cabin is Amalia, who functions as a housekeeper and who is Molly’s biological mother; she and Molly’s father had a fling before he met Nora, and she gave her baby up to the couple for adoption. Tensions are heightened by dissension in the family. Uncle Trevor, with the support of Aunt Claudia, wants to sell the family’s large tract of property to a developer. Molly’s father and grandmother, Nanny, resist. At the same time, Molly’s hormones are raging and she links up with a seventeen-year-old boy who smokes pot and is pressuring her to have sex. Matters come to startling climax one night during that summer.
A Kirkus Reviews contributor, in a review of Pretending to Dance, objected that the novel is “marred by excessive sentimentality and superfluous exposition that dilutes the drama.” Other reviewers, however, were more positive. Connie Williams, looking at the novel as a potential young-adult selection for School Library Journal, called it “an excellent choice for mature teens.” Booklist writer Stephanie Turza called Pretending to Dance “a multilayered, poignant novel.” For Carrie Townsend, writing for RT Book Reviews, the novel is “stunning” and an “emotionally riveting page-turner.” Finally, Ben Steelman, in a review of the novel for the Star News in Pittsford, New York, concluded: “This is soap opera, but soap opera of an extremely high caliber, and Chamberlain’s poignant, well-rounded character sketches lift Pretending to Dance well above the norm.”
Chamberlain’s 2017 novel, The Stolen Marriage, is set in the 1940s and features Tess, a young woman from Baltimore who, through a series of mistakes and unfortunate events, winds up in a loveless marriage in the South. Engaged to a doctor, her marriage plans are put on hold until he can return from an assignment treating polio patients. Bored, Tess has a one-night stand with Henry, a manufacturer from North Carolina. When she discovers she is pregnant, she finds Henry, hoping for child support. Instead, he proposes marriages, and agreeing, Tess becomes involved in a gothic atmosphere amid his family in Hickory, North Carolina. Deaths follow, and the baby does not reach term. Amid a polio epidemic in Hickory, Tess struggles to discover the origin of Henry’s increasingly mysterious behavior.
A Kirkus Reviews critic had a varied assessment of The Stolen Marriage, noting: “Things develop predictably until, suddenly and belatedly, the plot heats up in an unpredictable but also unconvincing way. An overly anodyne attempt at Southern gothic.” A Publishers Weekly reviewer found more to like, commenting that the author “conveys a strong sense of daily life in the American South during WWII, and the concurrent devastation of the polio epidemic, in this well-crafted crime-tinged tale of a marriage of convenience.” Similarly, Booklist reviewer Jen Baker concluded: “Compelling details of patients’ experiences, treatment of African Americans and of women, plus a tinge of mystery will all hold readers’ interest in this veteran author’s latest.” An online All about Romance contributor was also impressed with this novel, noting: “The Stolen Marriage is the kind of story that will grab you and refuse to let you go until you turn the last page – I would have read it in one sitting if it had been possible. Ms. Chamberlain transported me out of my world and into Tess’s, and I enjoyed every minute I spent there.”
Chamberlain’s 2018 novel, The Dream Daughter, features the young widow, Carly Sears, whose husband has been killed in the Vietnam war. Her one hold on life is the fact that she is pregnant and looks forward to the child’s birth. Then she learns the unborn baby girl has a heart condition from which she will die before birth. Medical practice in 1970 cannot save the baby, but her brother-in-law, a physicist with a shadowy past, tells her he knows how to save the infant. However, his solution–to travel through time to save her daughter–will take every ounce of strength and courage Carly can muster.
“With a little tension and a lot of heart, The Dream Daughter will delight Chamberlain’s fans and hook new readers,” noted Booklist contributor Tracy Babiasz. A Publishers Weekly reviewer was also impressed, writing: “This is a page-turning crowd-pleaser.” Similarly, a Kirkus Reviews critic concluded: “The story is well-paced and the ending satisfyingly sweet despite its predictability.” An online Book Review Café contributor likewise observed: “Chamberlain has a knack of creating characters that are not only multi-dimensional but she also draws on the raw emotions the characters are feeling. … Chamberlain has written a multi-layered, genre crossing, complex novel that is both emotive and compelling, and a novel that I found a joy to read.”
Published in 2020, Big Lies in a Small Town tells the tale of several lives that become interconnected through a mural in a small North Carolina town. Morgan Christopher is a twenty-two-year-old artist who has served a year in jail for a felony DUI. She is released by a powerful lawyer (backed by the money of a deceased philanthropist, Jesse Williams) in order to finish a mural begun in 1939 by another twenty-two-year-old female artist, Anna Dale. Divided by decades, these two women face many of the same obstacles, even as Morgan begins to fall in love with the curator of the philanthropist Williams’ gallery. The machinations of a third artist, frustrated local portraitist Martin Drapple, who was rejected in the competition for the mural, further complicate matters.
A Publishers Weekly reviewer found Big Lies in a Small Town to be a “rich novel … [that] will keep readers turning the pages.” Similarly, a Kirkus Reviews critic dubbed this an “engaging, well-researched, and sometimes thought-provoking art mystery.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, March 1, 1997, Michele Leber, review of The Escape Artist, p. 1109; February 15, 2001, Diana Tixier Herald, review of The Courage Tree, p. 1114; February 1, 2002, Patty Engelmann, review of Cypress Point, p. 920; February 1, 2003, Diana Tixier Herald, review of Kiss River, p. 976; February 15, 2004, Diana Tixier Herald, review of Her Mother’s Shadow, p. 1035; December 15, 2004, Kristine Huntley, review of The Bay at Midnight, p. 690; May 1, 2008, Patty Engelmann, review of Before the Storm, p. 69; May 1, 2009, Claire Orphan, review of Secrets She Left Behind, p. 66; May 1, 2008, Patty Engelmann, review of Before the Storm, p. 69; May 1, 2009, Claire Orphan, review of Secrets She Left Behind, p. 66; May 15, 2010, Claire Orphan, review of The Lies We Told, p. 21; April 15, 2011, Julie Trevelyan, review of The Midwife’s Confession, p. 24; July 1, 2013, Julie Trevelyan, review of Necessary Lies, p. 30; October 1, 2014, Stephanie Turza, review of The Silent Sister, p. 35; October 15, 2015, Stephanie Turza, review of Pretending to Dance, p. 17; September 1, 2017, Jen Baker, review of The Stolen Marriage, p. 56; August 1, 2018, Tracy Babiasz, review of The Dream Daughter, p. 24.
Kirkus Reviews, August 1, 2013, review of Necessary Lies; August 15, 2014, review of The Silent Sister; August 1, 2015, review of Pretending to Dance; August 1, 2017, review of The Stolen Marriage; August 1, 2018, review of The Dream Daughter; November 1, 2019, review of Big Lies in a Small Town.
Library Journal, May 15, 2010, Julie Kane, review of The Lies We Told, p. 67; August 1, 2013, Lesa Holstine, review of Necessary Lies, p. 83; September 1, 2014, Brooke Bolton, review of The Silent Sister, p. 90.
Publishers Weekly, January 11, 1991, Sybil Steinberg, review of Secret Lives, p. 90; March 8, 1993, review of Fire and Rain, p. 68; January 20, 1997, review of The Escape Artist, p. 393; January 18, 1999, review of Breaking the Silence, p. 336; December 20, 1999, review of Summer’s Child, p. 62; December 18, 2000, review of The Courage Tree, p. 53; January 14, 2002, review of Cypress Point, p. 41; February 2, 2004, review of Her Mother’s Shadow, p. 60; January 10, 2005, review of The Bay at Midnight, p. 37; September 26, 1994, review of Brass Ring, p. 52; February 19, 1996, review of Reflection, p. 204; March 17, 2008, review of Before the Storm, p. 44; April 19, 2010, review of The Lies We Told, p. 32; March 21, 2011, review of The Midwife’s Confession, p. 52; February 20, 2012, review of The Good Father, p. 139; July 8, 2013, review of Necessary Lies, p. 64; August 13, 2018, review of The Dream Daughter, p. 44.
School Library Journal, December, 2015, Connie Williams, review of Pretending to Dance, p. 131.
ONLINE
All about Romance, http://www.likesbooks.com/ (December 22, 2013), review of The Good Father; (November 15, 2019), review of The Stolen Marriage.
Book Review Café, https://thebookreviewcafe.com/ (November 16, 2018), review of The Dream Daughter.
Books and Random Thoughts Blog, http://booksandrandomthoughts.blogspot.com/ (January 15, 2006), review of The Escape Artist.
Books in the City, http://booksnyc.blogspot.com/ (August 27, 2012), review of The Midwife’s Confession.
Contemporary Romance Writers, http://contemporaryromancewriters.com/ (August 17, 2003), review of Keeper of the Light.
Crazy for Books, http://www.crazy-for-books.com/ (July 20, 2009) review of Before the Storm; (July 25, 2009), review of Secrets She Left Behind.
Diane Chamberlain, http://www.dianechamberlain.com (November 15, 2019).
Fantastic Fiction, https://www.fantasticfiction.com/ (November 15, 2019), “Diane Chamberlain.”
Fiction Book Review, http://www.fictionbookreview.com/ (June 15, 2012), review of The Good Father.
Gather, http://www.gather.com/ (June 25, 2009), review of The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes.
Genre Go Round Reviews, http://genregoroundreviews.blogspot.com/ (May 5, 2008), Harriet Klausner, review of Before the Storm; (April 28, 2009), Harriet Klausner, review of Secrets She Left Behind.
Laurie Here, http://www.lauriehere.com/ (October 19, 2014), review of The Silent Sister.
Novel Menagerie, http://anovelmenagerie.com/ (May 27, 2012) review of The Good Father.
PanMacmillan, http://www.panmacmillan.com/ (December 3, 2013), “Diane Chamberlain.”
Publishers Weekly, https://www.publishersweekly.com/ (September 27, 2019), review of Big Lies in a Small Town.
Romance Book Club, http://www.theromancebookclub.com (June 5, 2009), Tara Green, interview with author.
Romance Readers Connection, http://www.theromancereadersconnection.com/ (November 20, 2009), Jeri Neal, review of Secrets She Left Behind.
Romance Reviews Today, http://www.romrevtoday.com/ (June 1, 2008), Diana Risso, review of Before the Storm.
RT Book Reviews, http://www.rtbookreviews.com/ (November 20, 2009), Catherine Witmer, reviews of Before the Storm, The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes, and Secrets She Left Behind; Jill M. Smith, reviews of Brass Ring and Reflection; (June 1, 2010), Catherine Witmer, review of The Lies We Told; (May 1, 2011), Victoria Frerichs, review of The Midwife’s Confession; (May 1, 2012), Sarah Eisenbraun, review of The Good Father; (September 1, 2013), B. Nakia Garner, review of Necessary Lies; (June 4, 2016), Carrie Townsend, review of Pretending to Dance.
Rundpinne, http://www.rundpinne.com/ (April 27, 2011), review of The Midwife’s Confession.
Star News (Pittsford, NY), http://www.starnewsonline.com/ (October 11, 2015), Ben Steelman, review of Pretending to Dance.
Trashionista, http://www.trashionista.com/ (June 12, 2009), Wendy Knowles, review of The Lost Daughter.
I was an insatiable reader as a child, and that fact, combined with a vivid imagination, inspired me to write. I penned a few truly terrible “novellas” at age twelve, then put fiction aside for many years as I pursued my education.
I grew up in Plainfield, New Jersey and spent my summers at the Jersey Shore, two settings that have found their way into my novels. In high school, my favorite authors were the unlikely combination of Victoria Holt and Sinclair Lewis. I loved Holt’s flair for gothic suspense and Lewis’s character studies as well as his exploration of social values, and both those authors influenced the writer I am today.
I attended Glassboro State College in New Jersey before moving to San Diego, where I received both my bachelor’s and master’s degrees in social work from San Diego State University. After graduating, I worked in a couple of youth counseling agencies and then focused on medical social work, which I adored. I worked in hospitals in San Diego and Washington, D.C. before opening a private psychotherapy practice in Alexandria, Virginia, specializing in adolescents. I reluctantly closed my practice when I realized that I could no longer split my time between two careers and be effective at both of them.
It was while I was working in San Diego that I started writing. I’d had a story in my mind since I was a young adolescent about a group of people living together at the Jersey Shore. While waiting for a doctor’s appointment one day, I pulled out a pen and pad and began putting that story on paper. Once I started, I couldn’t stop. I took a class in fiction writing, but for the most part, I “learned by doing.” That story, PRIVATE RELATIONS, took me four years to complete. I sold it in 1986, but it wasn’t published until 1989 (three very long years!), when it earned me the RITA award for Best Single Title Contemporary Novel. Except for a brief stint writing for daytime TV (One Life to Live) and a few miscellaneous articles for newspapers and magazines, I’ve focused my efforts on book-length fiction and have written twenty-six novels.
My stories are often filled with twists and surprises and–I hope–they also tug at the emotions. Relationships — between men and women, parents and children, sisters and brothers – are always the primary focus of my books. I can’t think of anything more fascinating than the way people struggle with life’s trials and tribulations, both together and alone.
I now live and write in North Carolina, the state which has become my true home and has also spawned many settings for my stories. I live with my significant other, John, a photographer, and my sweet Shetland Sheepdog, Cole. I have three grown stepdaughters, a couple of sons-in-law and four grandbabies.
For me, the real joy of writing is having the opportunity to touch readers with my words. I hope that my stories move you in some way and give you hours of enjoyable reading.
Diane Chamberlain
Diane Chamberlain is the RITA Award winning author of sixteen novels, published in over twelve languages. A former hospital social worker and psychotherapist, Diane writes complex stories about relationships, redemption and forgiveness with a touch of mystery and suspense. She lives in North Carolina with her significant other, John, and her shelties, Keeper and Jet.
Genres: Romance, General Fiction, Romantic Suspense, Mystery, Historical
New Books
January 2020
(paperback)
Big Lies in a Small Town
Series
Keeper Trilogy
1. Keeper of the Light (1992)
2. Kiss River (2003)
3. Her Mother's Shadow (2004)
Before the Storm
1. Before the Storm (2008)
2. Secrets She Left Behind (2009)
Necessary Lies
0.5. The First Lie (2013)
1. Necessary Lies (2013)
Riley MacPherson
0.5. The Broken String (2014)
1. The Silent Sister (2014)
Pretending to Dance
The Dance Begins (2015)
Pretending to Dance (2015)
Novels
Private Relations (1989)
aka Secrets at the Beach House
Lovers and Strangers (1990)
Secret Lives (1991)
Fire and Rain (1993)
Brass Ring (1994)
Reflection (1996)
The Escape Artist (1997)
Breaking the Silence (1999)
Summer's Child (2000)
The Courage Tree (2001)
Cypress Point (2002)
aka The Shadow Wife / The Forgotten Son
The Bay at Midnight (2005)
The Secret Life of Ceecee Wilkes (2006)
aka The Lost Daughter / A Beautiful Lie
The Lies We Told (2010)
The Midwife's Confession (2011)
The Good Father (2012)
The Stolen Marriage (2017)
The Dream Daughter (2018)
Big Lies in a Small Town (2020)
Omnibus
Diane Chamberlain 6 Volume Set (2012)
Collections
The Journey Home (2004) (with Catherine Asaro, Lucy Grijalva, Mallory Kane, Candice Kohl, Linda Madl, Mary Jo Putney, Patricia Rice, Cynthia Valero and Rebecca York)
Awards
Rita Awards Best Novel winner (1990) : Private Relations
Diane Chamberlain
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Diane Chamberlain
Born
United States
Occupation
Novelist
Period
1990-present
Website
dianechamberlain.com
Diane Chamberlain is an American author of adult fiction. Diane Chamberlain is the New York Times, USA Today and Sunday Times [1] bestselling author of 30 novels published in more than twenty languages. Some of her most popular books include Necessary Lies, The Silent Sister, The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes, and The Keeper of the Light Trilogy. Diane likes to write complex stories about relationships between men and women, parents and children, brothers and sisters, and friends. Although the thematic focus of her books often revolves around family, love, compassion and forgiveness, her stories usually feature a combination of drama, mystery, secrets and intrigue. Diane's background in psychology has given her a keen interest in understanding the way people tick, as well as the background necessary to create her realistic characters.
Diane was born and raised in Plainfield, New Jersey and spent her summers at the Jersey Shore. She also lived for many years in San Diego and northern Virginia before making North Carolina her home.
Diane received her Bachelor's and master's degrees in clinical social work from San Diego State University. Prior to her writing career, Diane worked in hospitals in San Diego and Washington, D.C. before opening a private psychotherapy practice in Alexandria, Virginia specializing in adolescents. All the while Diane was writing on the side. Her first book, Private Relations was published in 1989 and it earned the RITA award for Best Single Title Contemporary Novel.
Diane lives with her partner, photographer John Pagliuca, and her sheltie, Cole. She has three stepdaughters, two sons-in-law, and four grandchildren. She's currently at work on her next novel.[2]
Novels[edit]
1989 – Private Relations
1990 – Lovers and Strangers
1991 – Secret Lives
1992 – Keeper of the Light
1993 – Fire and Rain
1995 – Brass Ring
1996 – Reflection
1997 – The Escape Artist
1999 – Breaking the Silence (aka Remembering Me)
1999 – Summer’s Child
2001 – The Courage Tree
2002 – Cypress Point (aka The Shadow Wife) (aka The Forgotten Son)
2003 – Kiss River
2004 – Her Mother’s Shadow
2005 – The Bay at Midnight
2005 – The Dreamer (short story in anthology The Journey Home)
2006 – The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes (aka A Beautiful Lie) (aka The Lost Daughter)
2008 - Before the Storm
2009 - Secrets She Left Behind
2010 - The Lies We Told
2011 - The Midwife's Confession
2012 - The Good Father
2013 - The First Lie (e-short story)
2013 - Necessary Lies
2013 - The Broken String (e-short story)
2014 - The Silent Sister
2015 - The Dance Begins (e-short story)
2015 - Pretending to Dance [3]
2017 - The Stolen Marriage[4]
2018 - The Dream Daughter
Diane Chamberlain is the New York Times, USA Today and (London) Sunday Times best-selling author of 27 novels. The daughter of a school principal who supplied her with a new book almost daily, Diane quickly learned the emotional power of story. Although she wrote many small "books" as a child, she didn't seriously turn to writing fiction until her early thirties when she was waiting for a delayed doctor's appointment with nothing more than a pad, a pen, and an idea. She was instantly hooked.
Diane was born and raised in Plainfield, New Jersey and lived for many years in both San Diego and northern Virginia. She received her master's degree in clinical social work from San Diego State University. Prior to her writing career, she was a hospital social worker in both San Diego and Washington, D.C, and a psychotherapist in private practice in Alexandria, Virginia, working primarily with adolescents.
More than two decades ago, Diane was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, which changed the way she works: She wrote two novels using voice recognition software before new medication allowed her to get back to typing. She feels fortunate that her arthritis is not more severe and that she's able to enjoy everyday activities as well as keep up with a busy travel schedule.
Diane lives in North Carolina with her significant other, photographer John Pagliuca, and their odd but lovable Shetland Sheepdog, Cole.
Please visit Diane's website at www.dianechamberlain.com for her event schedule and for more information on her newest novel, Big Lies in a Small Town, as well as a complete list of her books.
QUOTE:
engaging, well-researched, and sometimes thought-provoking art mystery."
Chamberlain, Diane BIG LIES IN A SMALL TOWN St. Martin's (Adult Fiction) $27.99 1, 14 ISBN: 978-1-250-08733-1
A tale of two artists, living 78 years apart in a small Southern town, and the third artist who links them.
The fates of two white painters in Edenton, North Carolina, intertwine with the legacy of a third, that of Jesse Jameson Williams, a prominent African American artist with Edenton roots. In 2018, the recently deceased Jesse has left a very unusual will. In life, Jesse paid his success forward by helping underdog artists. Morgan Christopher, the last, posthumous recipient of Jesse's largesse, can't imagine why he chose her, a complete stranger who is doing time for an alcohol-related crash that left another driver paralyzed. Released on an early parole engineered by Jesse's daughter, Lisa, Morgan will receive $50,000 to restore a mural painted by one Anna Dale in 1940 in time for a gallery opening on Aug. 5, 2018. If Morgan misses this deadline, not only is her deal off, but Lisa will, due to a puzzling, thinly motivated condition of Jesse's will, lose her childhood home. In an alternating narrative, Anna, winner of a U.S. Treasury Department competition, has been sent from her native New Jersey to paint a mural for the Edenton post office. Anna has zero familiarity with the South, particularly with Jim Crow. She recognizes Jesse's exceptional talent and mentors him, to the ire of Edenton's white establishment. Martin Drapple, a local portraitist rejected in the competition, is at first a good sport, when he's sober, until, somewhat too suddenly, he's neither. Issues of addiction and mental illness are foremost in both past and present. Anna's late mother had manic episodes. Morgan's estranged parents are unrepentant boozers. And Anna's mural of civic pride is decidedly strange. One of the strengths here is the creditable depiction of the painter's process, in Anna's case, and the restorer's art, in Morgan's. Despite the fraught circumstances challenging all three painters, conflict is lacking. The 1940 racial tensions are unrealistically mild, and Jesse's testamentary testiness is not mined for its full stakes-raising potential.
An engaging, well-researched, and sometimes thought-provoking art mystery.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2019 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Chamberlain, Diane: BIG LIES IN A SMALL TOWN." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Nov. 2019, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A604119714/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=645e2e1b. Accessed 9 Nov. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A604119714
QUOTE:
"This is a page-turning crowd-pleaser."
Diane Chamberlain. St. Martin's, $27.99 (384p) ISBN 978-1-250-08730-0
Chamberlain's exciting and heartfelt novel (after The Stolen Marriage) follows one woman who risks everything to travel through time and save the life of her unborn child. In 1970, after the death of her husband in the Vietnam War, pregnant Carly Sears moves in with her sister, Patti, and brother-in-law, Hunter, at their beach home in Nags Head, N.C. There, Carly finds that tragedy has followed her: she discovers that her unborn child has a fatal heart defect. It's at this point that Hunter reveals to Carly that he is a time traveler from the future and offers Carly a solution: she can time travel to 2001, where her child can receive life-saving fetal surgery. Carly finally believes Hunter's claims about time travel when his predictions about the tragic events at Kent State come true days later. After time traveling to 2001, Carly and her unborn child undergo an experimental surgery, remaining in New York City near the hospital prior to and after her daughter Joanna's birth. But Carly's plan to return to 1970 with Joanna is derailed when her daughter becomes ill and must remain hospitalized. Chamberlain expertly blends the time-travel elements with the wonderful story of a mother's love and the depths of sacrifice she makes for her child. This is a page-turning crowd-pleaser. 150,000-copy announced first printing. Agent: Susan Ginsburg, Writers House. (Oct.)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Dream Daughter." Publishers Weekly, 13 Aug. 2018, p. 44. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A550998377/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=968ef5c4. Accessed 9 Nov. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A550998377
QUOTE:
"With a little tension and a lot of heart, The Dream Daughter will delight Chamberlain's fans and hook new readers,"
The Dream Daughter.
By Diane Chamberlain.
Oct. 2018. 384p. St. Martin's, $27.99 (9781250087300).
Chamberlain (The Stolen Marriage, 2017) steps up her game with her latest, a departure from her usual plot and structure that still maintains the southern style that makes her so well loved among readers. Carly Sears is grieving the loss of her husband in the Vietnam War when she discovers she is pregnant. Joy quickly turns to distress when she finds out that her unborn daughter, the only thing she has left of her husband, has a heart problem. The medicine of 1970 isn't advanced enough to fix it, forcing her to face the inevitable death of her daughter before she is even born. Carly's brother-in-law, Hunter, comes to her with a plan to save the baby, one that seems utterly unbelievable and challenges what she knows to be true, yet may be her only hope. Chamberlain stretches her sense of familial relationships and toe-curling suspense in new directions, weaving in elements of trust, history, and time as she explores the things we do for love. With a little tension and a lot of heart, The Dream Daughter will delight Chamberlain's fans and hook new readers.--Tracy Babiasz
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Babiasz, Tracy. "The Dream Daughter." Booklist, 1 Aug. 2018, p. 24. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A550613105/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=8299b2e4. Accessed 9 Nov. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A550613105
QUOTE:
"Things develop predictably until, suddenly and belatedly, the plot heats up in an unpredictable but also unconvincing way. An overly anodyne attempt at Southern gothic."
Chamberlain, Diane THE STOLEN MARRIAGE St. Martin's (Adult Fiction) $26.99 10, 3 ISBN: 978-1-250-08727-0
A series of unfortunate errors consigns a Baltimore nurse to a loveless marriage in the South.It's 1943, and Tess, from Baltimore's Little Italy, is eagerly anticipating her upcoming nuptials. Her frustration grows, though, when her physician fiance, Vincent, accepts an extended out-of-town assignment to treat polio patients. On an impromptu excursion to Washington, D.C., Tess has too many martinis, resulting in a one-night stand with a chance acquaintance, a furniture manufacturer from North Carolina named Henry. Back in Baltimore, Tess' extreme Catholic guilt over her indiscretion is compounded by the discovery that she's pregnant. Eschewing a back-street abortion, she seeks out Henry in hopes of arranging child support--but to her shock, he proposes marriage instead. Once married to Henry and ensconced in his family mansion in Hickory, North Carolina, Tess gets a frosty reception from Henry's mother, Miss Ruth, and his sister, Lucy, not to mention the other ladies of Hickory, especially Violet, who thought she was Henry's fiancee. Tess' isolation worsens after Lucy dies in a freak car accident, and Tess, the driver, is blamed. Her only friends are the African-American servants of the household and an African-American medium who helps her make peace with a growing number of unquiet spirits, including her mother, who expired of shock over Tess' predicament, and Lucy, not to mention the baby, who did not make it to full term. The marriage is passionless but benign. Although Henry tries to be domineering, he always relents, letting Tess take the nurses' licensing exam and, later, go to work in Hickory's historic polio hospital. Strangely, despite the pregnancy's end, he refuses to divorce Tess. There are hints throughout that Henry has secrets; Lucy herself intimates as much shortly before her death. Once the polio hospital story takes over, the accident is largely forgotten, leading readers to suspect that Lucy's death was a convenient way of postponing crucial revelations about Henry. Things develop predictably until, suddenly and belatedly, the plot heats up in an unpredictable but also unconvincing way. An overly anodyne attempt at Southern gothic.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Chamberlain, Diane: THE STOLEN MARRIAGE." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Aug. 2017. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A499572803/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=1361e89d. Accessed 9 Nov. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A499572803
QUOTE:
"conveys a strong sense of daily life in the American South during WWII, and the concurrent devastation of the polio epidemic, in this well-crafted crime-tinged tale of a marriage of convenience."
The Stolen Marriage
Diane Chamberlain. St. Martin's, $26.99 (384p) ISBN 978-1-250-08727-0
Bestseller Chamberlain (Necessary Lies) conveys a strong sense of daily life in the American South during WWII, and the concurrent devastation of the polio epidemic, in this well-crafted crime-tinged tale of a marriage of convenience. Theresa "Tess" DeMello, a 23-year-old nurse-in-training, and Henry "Hank" Kraft meet via a chance encounter during an unchaperoned trip to Washington, D.C.; alcohol and bad decision-making result in Tess's pregnancy and their subsequent wedding. Tess relocates from Baltimore to Hank's hometown of Hickory, N.C., where his family owns a furniture factory. One morning, Tess agrees to drive her sister-in-law, Lucy, on an errand in an attempt to improve their strained relationship. Lucy hints at dark secrets in Henry's life that Tess is not privy to, and requests a detour to deliver a mysterious envelope--a detour with fatal consequences. Details like Tess's Catholic background, casual cultural biases, and the balance she strikes between independence and suppression of her own personality, in response to her husband and in-laws, enrich the story. Agent: Susan Ginsburg, Writers House. (Oct.)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Stolen Marriage." Publishers Weekly, 14 Aug. 2017, p. 49. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A501717086/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=114ecddc. Accessed 9 Nov. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A501717086
QUOTE:
"Compelling details of patients' experiences, treatment of African Americans and of women, plus a tinge of mystery will all hold readers' interest in this veteran author's latest."
The Stolen Marriage. By Diane Chamberlain. Oct. 2017.384p. St. Martin's, $26.99 (9781250087270); e-book, $12.99 (9781250087294).
Tess and Vinnies plan to marry was as organic as Catholicism in Little Italy--they grew up together; they fell in love. Despite WWII and numerous wedding postponements, the future looked good for their dream of working together as doctor and nurse. Until Tess visits the big city and makes a mistake: she gets drunk, loses her virginity to a stranger, and becomes pregnant. Instead of confessing to Vinnie (or her family), or risking a 1944-style abortion, she runs to Hickory, North Carolina, and marries the baby's father. WWII values aside, this novel is improbable on several levels. It partly redeems itself, however, by creating a realistic historical perspective on the polio epidemic (Vinnies area of expertise) and on one heroic rural town famous for its polio hospital. Compelling details of patients' experiences, treatment of African Americans and of women, plus a tinge of mystery will all hold readers' interest in this veteran author's latest. Combines the issue-driven style of Jodi Picoult, the romantic tension of Nora Roberts, and the life defining-mistake motif of Amy Hatvany's It Happens All the Time (2017).--Jen Baker
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Baker, Jen. "The Stolen Marriage." Booklist, 1 Sept. 2017, p. 56. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A509161615/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=8ab3e97e. Accessed 9 Nov. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A509161615
QUOTE:
"The story is well-paced and the ending satisfyingly sweet despite its predictability."
Chamberlain, Diane THE DREAM DAUGHTER St. Martin's (Adult Fiction) $27.99 10, 2 ISBN: 978-1-250-08730-0
A devoted mother is forced to make a terrible choice when 9/11 glitches her brother-in-law's time-travel calculations in Chamberlain's (The Stolen Marriage, 2017, etc.) latest.
Caroline "Carly" Grant is a physical therapist in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Her patient Hunter Poole refuses to use the crutches he needs to walk while his broken leg mends. Carly soon discovers Hunter isn't the suicidal accident victim he's presumed to be. In fact, he's a time traveler from the future. Hunter meets and marries Carly's Beatles-obsessed sister, Patti, fixing him in the late 1960s. That proves convenient when Carly, pregnant and recently widowed by her husband's death in Vietnam, is told her baby has a fatal heart defect. Hunter arranges for Carly to time travel to 2001. With the grudging assistance of Hunter's mother, Myra Poole, who runs a time-travel research program, Carly has fetal surgery and delivers her baby. Newborn Johanna Elizabeth proves so unhealthy she's hospitalized for most of the next four months, forcing Carly to time travel back to 1970 without her. Traveling through time is fraught with danger for not only the traveler, but also the reader, who's asked to suspend a lot of disbelief, accept arbitrary and at times inconsistent rules of time travel, and try not to guess several obvious plot twists. Still, Carly is a likable heroine, and if many of her difficulties are easily overcome, she's nonetheless caught in a heart-wrenching dilemma as she realizes time travel is, "if anything, an inexact science."
The story is well-paced and the ending satisfyingly sweet despite its predictability.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Chamberlain, Diane: THE DREAM DAUGHTER." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Aug. 2018. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A548138143/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=49f1b0f0. Accessed 9 Nov. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A548138143
QUOTE:
"Chamberlain has a knack of creating characters that are not only multi-dimensional but she also draws on the raw emotions the characters are feeling. ... Chamberlain has written a multi-layered, genre crossing, complex novel that is both emotive and compelling, and a novel that I found a joy to read."
The Dream Daughter by Diane Chamberlain #BookReview @D_Chamberlain
14 Replies
Today I’m sharing my review for the latest novel by Diane Chamberlain, The Dream Daughter. As a huge crime thriller reader, there are just a handful of authors outside this genre that I turn to when I need a “non crime fiction fix” and this author is one of them.
When Caroline Sears receives the news that her unborn baby girl has a heart defect, she is devastated. It is 1970 and there seems to be little that can be done. But her brother-in-law, a physicist, tells her that perhaps there is. Hunter appeared in their lives just a few years before—and his appearance was as mysterious as his past. With no family, no friends, and a background shrouded in secrets, Hunter embraced the Sears family and never looked back.
Now, Hunter is telling her that something can be done about her baby’s heart. Something that will shatter every preconceived notion that Caroline has. Something that will require a kind of strength and courage that Caroline never knew existed. Something that will mean a mind-bending leap of faith on Caroline’s part.
And all for the love of her unborn child.
A rich, genre-spanning, breathtaking novel about one mother’s quest to save her child, unite her family, and believe in the unbelievable. Diane Chamberlain pushes the boundaries of faith and science to deliver a novel that you will never forget.
I have long been a fan of Diane Chamberlain I just adore her books, now if I’m honest I had reservations about reading The Dream Daughter as I read on line that the author’s latest book is part science fiction, don’t get me wrong I’m not adverse to reading this genre I just couldn’t work out how a authors whose novels normally focus on very human story’s could possibly incorporate science fiction into one of her story’s. After finishing this novel I have to admit the author has done a fabulous job, and the mix of genres exactly made The Dream Daughter a unique read which captured my imagination.
The Dream Daughter is a novel about one mother’s quest to save her child. Carly finds out that her unborn baby has a heart defect. There’s no treatment available in 1970, and the baby will likely not survive after birth. Her enigmatic brother in law Hunter has knowledge of treatment that could help Caroline’s unborn baby, but first he needs to convince her to take a mind-bending leap of faith. This description may seem vague but I’m desperate not to give away the heart of this novel and spoil the read for others. The way Diane Chamberlain has crafted a story of a mother’s love, risking everything she knows and believes, all for the love for her daughter was incredibly moving at times. If I’m giving you the impression The Dream Daughter makes for a depressing read I apologise, this novel also has uplifting and heartwarming moments that warm the heart.
Diane Chamberlain has a knack of creating characters that are not only multi dimensional but she also draws on the raw emotions the characters are feeling. You feel Carly’s despair, you understand her need to do everything in her power to save her daughter, you empathise when Carly has to make heart breaking choices, you feel like your alongside Carly on her journey. I’m really pleased the author decided not to give The Dream Daughter the ending I envisaged, personally I found the authors conclusion to be a more satisfactory one (that’s why I’m not an author) it was definitely more fitting to the overall story. Diane Chamberlain has written a multi-layered, genre crossing, complex novel that is both emotive and compelling, and a novel that I found a joy to read.
Print Length: 380 pages
Publisher: Macmillan; Main Market edition (18 Oct. 2018)
QUOTE:
"The Stolen Marriage is the kind of story that will grab you and refuse to let you go until you turn the last page – I would have read it in one sitting if it had been possible. Ms. Chamberlain transported me out of my world and into Tess’s, and I enjoyed every minute I spent there.”
Desert Isle Keeper
The Stolen Marriage
Diane Chamberlain
Buy This Book
I’ve been a huge fan of Diane Chamberlain’s work since the early 2000s. Everything she writes is filled with well-drawn characters who are in the midst of varied and complex situations. When I learned she was writing a novel set during the Second World War, I was over the moon, as that’s one of my favorite historical periods to read about. The Stolen Marriage was everything I hoped it would be, and so much more besides.
Twenty-three-year-old Tess Demello is about to start the life of her dreams. She’ll soon be married to Vincent, the boy next door who turned out to be the love of her life. He’s a doctor, and Tess, with her nursing degree, plans to work beside him when he goes into private practice in Baltimore. Eventually, they’ll start a family, and Tess can’t imagine wanting anything more out of life.
Unfortunately, Vincent’s attitude toward Tess begins to change; he begins working at a polio clinic in Chicago, and he’s away for months at a time. Tess begins to doubt his love for her, especially since Vincent continually postpones the date of his return home. So, when her best friend suggests Tess accompany her on a night out in Washington D.C., Tess agrees, telling herself she deserves to have a little fun. After all, Vincent isn’t likely to be pining for her. But things in D.C. don’t go the way Tess expected they would, and the night ends with an intoxicated Tess in bed with Henry Kraft, a handsome and mysterious stranger.
Tess returns home, determined to put her indiscretion behind her. She’ll never see Henry again, and she and Vincent will get married and hopefully live happily ever after. At least, they will, if Vincent ever comes home. But, when she realizes she’s pregnant with Henry’s child, Tess is faced with the most difficult decision of her life. Can she trick Vincent into thinking the child is his, or will she tell him the truth, thus ending their engagement?
After much soul-searching and a trip to the small town of Hickory, North Carolina, where Henry lives and works, Tess decides to end her engagement to Vincent and marry Henry instead. It’s not the most well-thought-out plan, but Henry seems determined to do the right thing by Tess and their unborn child. He’s quite wealthy, and he promises to give Tess every advantage. True, they don’t love each other, but Tess is sure love will blossom in time.
Tess and Henry are married quickly, and she is soon ensconced in his family home. She’s not wild about having to live with Henry’s mother and younger sister, but he assures her it’s only for a short time, just until he can have a house built for them. Tess hopes to become friends with Henry’s relatives, but it soon becomes apparent to both Tess and the reader that this is not a likely outcome. The Kraft women seem to resent her presence, and both go out of their way to be extremely unpleasant. Tess is baffled by their open hostility, but before long she realizes she has more important things to worry about than the rudeness of her in-laws.
Although Henry was quick to suggest he and Tess get married, he doesn’t seem at all inclined to treat Tess as his wife. They sleep in separate beds and never make love; he stays out late most nights, and is extremely evasive when Tess questions his whereabouts. Obviously, there’s more to Henry than first meets the eye, and Tess will have her work cut out for her if she ever hopes to learn the truth.
This story is much more than the summary I’ve given you, but nothing I could write would do Ms. Chamberlain’s latest novel justice. It’s part love story with a hint of the paranormal thrown in and part mystery. But, most of all, it’s the story of one woman’s struggle to find herself and her purpose in a changing world.
Tess is a delightful heroine. She makes her share of mistakes, but she learns from them and goes on to become a better person. I fully expected her to crumble under the dislike of Henry’s friends and family, but she is possessed of remarkable courage and stands strong in her convictions. Henry doesn’t want her to work, but when a polio epidemic sweeps through the town, she defies his wishes and goes to work at the newly-constructed hospital because she knows in her heart it’s the right thing to do.
The supporting characters are expertly drawn. I definitely didn’t like them all, but I was able to understand and even sympathize with many of the reasons for their undesirable behavior, and, in my book, that’s a real plus. I don’t like cookie-cutter characters. I want to know and understand the people I’m reading about, even those I dislike.
The Stolen Marriage is the kind of story that will grab you and refuse to let you go until you turn the last page – I would have read it in one sitting if it had been possible. Ms. Chamberlain transported me out of my world and into Tess’s, and I enjoyed every minute I spent there. Hickory isn’t the nicest place I’ve ever read about, though. It brims with racial tension and deeply buried secrets, but it feels incredibly authentic.
This novel is sure to appeal to those who are established fans of Ms. Chamberlain’s books, as well as those who have never read her before. It’s something I’ll be recommending to all my book-loving friends. It really is that good.
QUOTE:
rich novel ... [that] will keep readers turning the pages."
Big Lies in a Small Town
Diane Chamberlain. St. Martin’s, $27.99 (400p) ISBN 978-1-250-08733-1
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This rich novel from Chamberlain (The Silent Sister) tracks artists whose lives intertwine after a mural is commissioned for a small town. In 1939, 22-year-old New Jersey artist Anna Dale is in Edenton, N.C., having won a federal art contest and being chosen to paint a mural for Edenton’s post office. The completed piece, however, is mysteriously never installed. In 2018, another 22-year-old artist, Morgan Christopher, is connected to the mural. Morgan has served a year in a North Carolina prison for a felony DUI, but she’s released by a powerful private lawyer in order to restore Anna’s damaged mural, which has been in storage. An artist and philanthropist, Jesse Jameson Williams, has died, and in his will, his adult daughter, Lisa, is instructed to ensure that Morgan restore the painting. Morgan doesn’t understand how Williams knew of her, though she had admired his work for years. Single father Oliver Jones, another recipient of Williams’s generosity and curator of Williams’s gallery, uses his training in restoration to help Morgan. She’s grateful for his help, and an attraction develops between them. Anna and Morgan’s passion for their craft serves as an enticing connection as they work on the same project decades apart. Chamberlain’s depictions of creative beauty and perseverance across time and in the face of inevitable obstacles will keep readers turning the pages. Agent: Susan Ginsberg, Writers House. (Jan.)