Swimming Lessons

I have fell in love with the characters in the books. I loved everything about this book. Everyone would love this series.

Mary Alice Monroe does it again in exploring relationships and real life. As a fan for many years now I couldn't wait to read this new novel. I read "Swimming Lessons" with a thirst to be quenched and wasn't disappointed in any way!!! This author is fantastic!!! Having lived on the SE Georgia coast for almost 25 years now I could relate to the surroundings and the pictures painted with Monroe's words were music to my soul. I visited the Georgia Sea Turtle Center on Jekyll Island a couple of weeks after finishing the work and found the exact turtle rehabilitation set-up that was described. As I went around the Center and then to the Nursery I had to tell everyone that they needed to read "Swimming Lessons." Bravo, Mary Alice!!! Please create us some more to read!!! You not only write well but you make a difference with your stories as well...definitely a book worth reading and life well lived...

Swimming Lessons is a wonderful sequel to The Beach House. It has such wonderful relationships among the characters themselves and with the loggerhead turtles and the coastal environment.

This absolutely wonderful sequel to "The Beach House" brings together all the "turtle ladies" whose mission it is to rescue endangered sea turtles who lumber up onto South Carolina's beaches once a year to lay their eggs in a timeless ritual. Civilization being what it is, the nests would be destroyed, purposely or not, if this dedicated band of women (and men) were not there each year to tirelessly make sure that doesn't happen. Like "The Beach House," this book is based on fact; Monroe herself is a self-proclaimed turtle lady. The plot revolves around the characters we met in the first book: Single mother Toy now has her degree and a job at the aquarium, which is about to get much more prestigious. Her darling little girl Lovie, named after the matriarch who passed away in the last book, is a precocious, wonderful 6-year-old, a self-proclaimed "LITTLE turtle lady." Cara and Brett, who fell in love in the last book and married, are trying hard to have a baby. Irrascible Flo is getting older and too proud to ask for help. And in this book, the menacing father of Toy's child, Darryl, suddently reappears, wanting to connect with the daughter he abandoned before her birth. All of this makes for a quick and interesting page-turner, but the backbone of the book is the conservation of the giant turtles, and for me, that's the grabber. "Swmming Lessons" is the perfect summertime book, whether you're at the beach (how more perfect could it get?), around a pool, or just lazing on your front porch. I urge you to grab it and gobble it up!

Ever since I unknowingly picked up a copy of The Beach House to take on a vacation, only to discover that it was all about my beloved Isle of Palms with such delightfully created characters, I have been reading everything written by Mary Alice Monroe I can find. Swimming Lessons did not disappoint. I feel as though Toy, Little Lovie, Flo, Cora, Brett and Ethan are now my personal friends. As I crossed the connector bridge to the Isle of Palms last evening, I pointed out to my children, exactly where I imagine that Cora and Brett live. I can't wait to start walking the beach during turtle egg laying season to see the turtle ladies and their labors of love. I will also anxiously await another sequel to see how Cora and Brett fare with their quest for a child, to watch Little Lovie grow up in the lowcountry and Ethan and Toy's relationship progress, and to watch Emmi settle back into island living with her roommate, Flo. Thank you for another great read. Alas, it was to have been my first beach book of the season, however, once I started reading, I could not stop and never quite made it to the beach!