Off Season
by: Anne Rivers Siddons
Published by: Grand Central Publishing/ Hachette Book Group (August 13 release)
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Reviewed by Kathy Perschmann
Siddon starts Off Season with Lilly Constable McCall returning to her family’s ancient summerhouse on the coast of Maine, with the ashes of her beloved husband Cam. Cam had died alone at the Maine house, preparing a surprise for Lilly. Her trip with Cam’s ashes takes her back in time, to her childhood at the Maine house, the special summer when she met and lost Jon, her first love.
Her mother, Elizabeth Constable, was a painter, and her father, an English professor at Georgetown University. Her older brother Jeebs, is barely a part of the family due to his mathematical genius and focused goals. After her mother’s bout with breast cancer, Lilly and her father grow closer together, and Lilly throws herself into swimming as a release from her pain. She feels free in the universe of water, buoyant and cushioned from the real world.
Lill meets Cam by accident, on an evening out with her father and her Aunt Tatty, when she is about to enter college. It is love at first sight, and Cam takes on the challenge of loosening her father’s grip on her life and her heart. Cam, however, has his own pain and his own tragedies to deal with. He is an architect, and often travels, taking Lilly with him when he can. As she becomes a renowned sculptor, she can travel less often with him.
Their grown daughters and her friends are concerned with how she is going to handle Cam’s death. She has taken the trip to Edgewater, the Maine house, to get away from their hovering concern. She revisits her past, and the laughter, tragedy and joy that fill the house bring her peace-until her last night in the house, after a terrible early snow storm, when she learns the truth about the comforting presence in the house and about her husband.
The beautiful evocative language and the lyrical descriptions of a carefree childhood in a stunning natural setting will make this book unforgettable.
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