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The Bungalow

by Sarah Jio
Plume: Penguin Group (USA). Dec. 2011. c.320p. ISBN 9780452297678. pap. $15. F
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It's 1942, and best friends Kitty and Anne, questioning their staid suburban lives, decide to join the Army Nurse Corps for a nine-month tour in the South Pacific. Anne leaves behind a mystified fiancé, she but feels a strong need to taste adventure before settling down. Free spirit Kitty finds that flirting with soldiers is much more fun than nursing the wounded, while Anne falls in love with Westry, a serious-minded soldier. Anne and Westry happily meet in secret in an abandoned beach bungalow, until the night they witness a murder. Before they can decide whether to report the crime, Westry is deployed, and Anne fears she'll never see him again. When she receives a letter more than 50 years later postmarked from Tahiti, Anne and her young niece decide it's time to find out what really happened all those years ago.
VERDICT This unabashedly romantic novel just narrowly avoids being sappy, thanks to Jio's (The Violets of March) deft handling of her plot and characters. Fans of Nicholas Sparks will enjoy this gentle historical love story.
Reviewed by Rebecca Vnuk, Forest Park, IL , Oct 01, 2011
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