The Summer Guest

May 10, 2004
A Maine fishing camp serves as the physical and emotional center for an extended circle of family and friends in this charming novel spanning three generations. On a single day in late summer, the rich financier Harry Wainwright, now dying of cancer, visits the camp he has frequented for more than 30 years. His visit prompts a flood of memories for each of the characters: Joe, who inherited the camp from his father but spent years away when his father convinced him to evade the Vietnam draft; Lucy, Joe's wife, whose love for her husband and the camp is intertwined with her love for Harry; Jordan, a young fishing guide who finds solace and purpose at the camp; and Lucy's daughter, Kate, an aspiring medical student whose presence links all of the characters. Each character tells a portion of their back-story in alternating chapters, and as the events of the day progress, the reader begins to understand the sources of the complex tension underlying each relationship. Chronologically, the story begins with the arrival of Joe's father to the camp just after World War II, and the whole novel has something of a 1940s feel about it: the bedrock realities of family and place remain constant in spite of the vicissitudes of emotions and events, and the voices of these Mainers have a lovely calm that evokes the timeless summer place. Though the pieces of the story fit almost too neatly and everyone ends up exactly where they should, the novel's recognition of human frailty and nobility rings true, as does its faithful recreation of a place outside the storms of history. Agent, Ellen Levine.

February 15, 2004
In this follow-up to the award-winning Mary and O'Neil, a dying man's last wish.

Copyright 2004 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

June 1, 2004
Love, loss, and the magnetic power of place are themes evoked in this luminous novel from the PEN/Faulkner Award-winning author of " Mary and O'Neil" (2001). Diagnosed with terminal cancer, celebrated financier Harry Wainwright longs for one more visit to a beloved fishing camp in the remote reaches of Maine, to cast "a flyline over water as still as God's held breath." Camp owner Joe Crosby, a Vietnam draft evader who inherited the property from his war-hero father, is honored to grant the wish of the kindly millionaire, who has been a summer visitor to the camp for more than 30 years. Arriving with his wife, son, and granddaughter in tow, the frail Wainwright makes a dramatic bequest that transforms a tranquil lakeside sojourn into a life-altering event. Narrated in alternating chapters by characters whose lives are inextricably linked to each other--and to the camp--Cronin's novel reveals the rugged beauty of his native New England and the tender terrain of the human heart.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2004, American Library Association.)