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Review: Santorini Sunsets by Anita Hughes



Blurb from Goodreads:
The seventh intoxicating love story by Anita Hughes, set in beautiful Santorini, Greece. When a Hollywood superstar and a NYC society girl fall in love, sparks fly and secrets are revealed.

Brigit Palmer is thrilled to be on the Greek Island of Santorini. She's here for her wedding to Hollywood heart-throb Blake Crawford, one of America's most eligible bachelors. Brigit's parents have rented a villa, and soon guests will arrive from all over the world for the intimate ceremony.

Brigit is a New York socialite, and she's just given up her position at a Manhattan law firm to run her father's philanthropic foundation. Things are finally falling into place. Love, career, family. Everything is going so well...until she steps into the garden and sees her ex-husband Nathaniel hiding in the rose bushes. 

Nathaniel, a failed novelist, announces that Blake sold the rights to the wedding to HELLO! Magazine for two million dollars (donated to charity), and he is the reporter assigned to write the story. Everyone expects Brigit to have her happily ever after, including her mother who taught her how to lead the perfect lifestyle, her younger sister Daisy who impatiently wishes for her own love story, and of course, her fiancé. Things are supposed to work out for them. But when Brigit discovers an unsettling secret about Blake, she questions everything she's ever believed about love, and wonders if she's better off alone.
My Review:
 
After the last book I read by this author (my second), I was pretty sure I wouldn't read another. And I should have listened to myself!  I don't know what it is but I read the descriptions of these books and the travel and the setting and I just so want the book to be amazing!  Unfortunately, this was my third (and last) book by this author that was more of a disappointment than anything.  I know I've said this about other books by this author but the descriptions of traditional roles and submissive devotion to husband and fashion and perfume and comparisons to Grace Kelly and #whitepeopleproblems just got to be too much for me (once again)!  And the same problem I had with Island in the Sea happened in this book -- we were on one track for the entire book and then abruptly we were somewhere else (with someone else).  I have officially given up on these books and this author and that means -- I NEED to hear from you re: great books with travel/great vacation settings. Something fun!

Santorini Sunsets comes out today, August 2, 2016, and you can purchase HERE.
Relationships were so difficult.  How could she protect her daughters from getting hurt?  Daisy was beautiful and talented but she questioned her own decisions as if she needed someone else's approval.   
Brigit usually moved like an actress in a 1950's movie who knew she could have anything she wanted with a title of the head.  The last couple of days she'd seemed as if she was trying to solve a difficult algebra problem.   
Maybe she should tell Brigit her marriage didn't have to consumer her; she still had her career and family and friends.  But was that really possible?  Of course you had to put your husband first, that was the point of the whole exercise.   
She gazed at wooden fishing boats and thought even when you tried to do the right thing, you often failed.  You buy your husband's favorite macarons at Bouchon only to discover he's give up sugar, or make reservations at the St. Regis and learn he spent the afternoon entertaining clients and craves a quiet evening at home.   
It was a wonder more people didn't get divorced.  You can be so confident you know everything about your spouse when you don't know anything at all.

Comments

  1. Oh no :( The whole bit about traditional roles and submissiveness doesn't sound good at all! I just found this today: 100 Days of Happiness which I am hoping will be good because Italy. And donuts for breakfast lol!

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  2. Yeah I can totally get sucked into a book because of an amazing setting and travel. Sorry this one and this author don't work for you. At least you know not to pick anymore of her stuff up!! Great review!

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  3. Well at least now you know this author just isn't for you right? Wonderful honest review. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Eva, this is what you have to do. Don't read books on travel and whatnot. Just come to PR and travel yourself :D I'll take you to all the places you should visit for free ;) In all seriousness, I'm sorry this author hasn't worked for you. I guess I won't even bother with this author. Great review!

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