Review: Summer by the Tides by Denise Hunter

Summer by the Tides

by Denise Hunter

Publisher: Thomas Nelson

Pages: 302

Format: book

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  Following a painful betrayal, Maddy Monroe's love life is a wreck, and her restaurant career is in shambles. When her grandmother goes missing, she and her estranged sisters converge at the family beach house in Sea Haven, North Carolina. Being with uptight Nora and free-spirited Emma at the place where their family broke apart is a struggle, and undercurrents of jealousy and resentment threaten to pull the sisters under. In the midst of the storm, sparks begin to fly between Maddy and Gram's maddening neighbor, Connor Murphy.

As the sisters pack up the family belongings, memories of idyllic, slow-paced summers are resurrected. But long-buried secrets also come to light as Maddy discovers that all was not as it appeared that last summer in Sea Haven--nor today in the seemingly perfect lives of her sisters.

As family tensions rise and Connor causes tumult in Maddy's heart, the sisters must find a way to accept each other for the women they've become before the bitterness of the past destroys their hope for a future.

Kritters Thoughts:  Maddy Monroe has both a professional and personal tragedy wrapped all in one and when her grandmother is discovered missing, this is the perfect escape from life, so she heads to small town South Carolina to find her grandmother and push a reset button.  Maddy's sisters Emma and Nora have had a battle for years about a betrayal from the past and all three sisters are called to find grandma and maybe also to confront the past and to hopefully heal.  

I love the dynamics of sisters who have had drama returning to a place of comfort and confronting it, it is a story that I will always love reading.  There is something special about sisters where we are required to be friends because we are family, but we probably hurt them the quickest and the easiest.  

The other thing that I loved about the book was that the author revealed the reason for the sister feud early in the book.  I don't love it when a reader is kept out of the dark and the characters know more than the reader.  Denise Hunter flashes back and the reader knows the basics early on into the book and then the details are revealed over time, the way this storyline was done was just on point.    

As a warning, Denise Hunter is a Christian fiction author and this one felt a little more infused with a message than other books have.  I wasn't offended by it, but I like to advise others in case that isn't something you like to read.  


Rating: definitely a good read, but can't read two in a row

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I received one copy of this book free of charge from TLC Book Tours.  I was not required to write a positive review in exchange for receipt of the book; rather, the opinions expressed in this review are my own.