I’d been looking forward to Robyn Carr’s Sunrise on Half Moon Bay, because I live in the area. Being familiar with the setting colors my review, even though Sunrise on Half Moon Bay is a work of fiction, so artistic-license is accepted and expected. But as a local, some aspects rang jarringly false. For instance, they met at the community pool (there is no community pool), and they go to a movie theater, though there is no local movie theatre. Carr references a snorkel shop, though no one snorkels here because the water is too cold. Beach volleyball is a rarity, etc. In general, it seems like this Half Moon Bay is set at least 50 miles south (around Santa Cruz), or even Santa Barbara.
The publisher might also have stayed truer to the purported setting — the cover illustration shows a woman on a fanciful dock facing the sunrise. Half Moon Bay is on the West Coast. The only east-facing sunrise, due to the odd curve of the coast, occurs in Santa Barbara. Sure, I’m being picky, but when I notice things like this, it takes me out of the story.
That’s okay, I didn’t expect verisimilitude. But nothing in the story depends on, nor is enhanced by, the location. It could have been set anywhere. The book could also have used a better editor. For instance, “Jake was in his midtwenties [sic], Adele still in high school, when he married Mary Ellen.” Yet earlier it was stated that Jake didn’t fall in love with Mary Ellen until Addie went to college.
Now, putting all of my reservations aside, I have to give Carr her due. The crux of this story revolves around the relationships between two sisters born 20 years apart, and the men in their lives. Carr succeeds in giving us complex and believable characters, natural dialogue, and sincere sentiments, with predictable though satisfying resolutions. She reminds me of a female Nicholas Sparks.
Recent Comments