OCEAN BEACH, by Wendy Wax
The newest book from Wendy Wax hit the shelves this week (June 26, 2012)! you’re headed out on vacation, or just looking for a great weekend read, you’d better be on your way to buy this book. OCEAN BEACH is a sequel to TEN BEACH ROAD (reviewed below), but you can easily pick this one up and read as a stand-alone.
Set in ultra-hot South Beach, the book brings together the wonderful cast of TEN BEACH ROAD once again. They’re paired with a new project house and a new business venture. The ladies have a fledgling reality TV show featuring their newfound talents. Unlike their previous restoration, the women don’t own this house. It comes as a package deal with its owner. Max is retired widowed comedian who used to roll with the likes of Lucy and Desi, and George and Gracie. Max’s career is over. His wife is gone and his only child has been missing since the 1960s. But he doesn’t complain. He brings the book more spark than the Fourth of July. The women are as intrigued by Max’s past as they are the house. And Max is more than willing to reminisce.
As in TEN BEACH ROAD, financial and emotional futures are at stake for Nicole, Maddie, Avery, Deirdra, and Maddie’s daughter, Kyra. Everything hangs on the success of the reality show. The women struggle to keep their personal lives intact while they tear down walls and rebuild a magnificent piece of South Beach architecture.
You’ll laugh, you’ll worry, and you’ll cry as Max and the women repair his house complete their respective journeys.
TEN BEACH ROAD by Wendy Wax
Three women from diverse backgrounds are thrown together by circumstance and one man’s greed. Maddie, a suburban housewife. Nicole, matchmaker to the rich and elite. Avery, who recently lost her position on a home improvement show to her undeserving husband. All are victims of a Ponzi scheme. Add a pregnant unmarried daughter whose baby-daddy is a married, mega-movie star, and financial ruin on all fronts with a dilapidated Florida mansion as the only possible salvation, and you’ve got the mixings for a great beach read.
Bella Flora is a run-down version of its former fabulous self. It’s the only asset given to three strangers as compensation for their vanished investment money. When they arrive to assess the property and arrange to have it put on the market, it’s in much worse shape than they’d imagined. With no cash, they use their individual talents to scrape, scrimp and salvage their way to restoring the once-magnificent beach mansion. As they live where they work, their lives intertwine in ways that go far beyond plaster and paint. Friendships come together faster than the house does, and solidarity is formed on all fronts. Until disaster comes in the form of both betrayal and natural forces.
If you’re like me, you’ll fall in love with the house as much as the characters. Whether or not you’re headed to the beach, grab this book for an instant vacation.
