About this item
"Beautifully written and closely observed, The Summer Cottage captures the deep and complicated love of family. Reading this lovely novel, I felt the embrace of summer on the shoreline." --Luanne Rice, New York Times bestselling author Spanning two summers decades apart, Susan Kietzman's poignant novel explores the complexities of the people--and places--that shape our lives... Helen Street spent every summer of her childhood at her family's cedar-shake cottage on Long Island Sound. The youngest of four, she shared her mother Claire's athletic genes and relished the orchestrated games and competitions that filled those warm, endless days. Unlike her older siblings--fiery Charlotte, ambitious Thomas, middle-child Pammy--Helen rarely felt the pressure of her mother's high expectations. Thirty years later, with her brother and sisters scattered, Helen is the sole caregiver for Claire, now terminally ill. Knowing her death is imminent, Claire has put Helen in the awkward position of telling the others that she plans on leaving everything, including the cottage, to Helen when she dies--unless everyone comes to the shore for a long weekend over the Fourth of July. During this time together, Helen, Charlotte, Pammy, and Thomas will revisit their long-ago decisions and assumptions. And they will face new choices that could shatter their fragile kinship--or reveal a family's extraordinary power to remember, to forgive, and to grow... "This is solid beach-read material that will be particularly appealing to those who like stories of family secrets." --BOOKLIST
About the Author
Susan Kietzman has been writing fiction for years, fitting it in and around raising her children, working various jobs, and enjoying life. When her boys were young, she wrote early in the morning. And she still does, although she allows more time for fiction now that the boys are mostly elsewhere. She graduated from Connecticut College with a B.A. in English and from Boston University with an M.S. in journalism. She has written for magazines, newspapers, and corporate websites, and taught English composition as an adjunct instructor at two community colleges. When she is not writing at home, she is writing grant proposals for Mystic Seaport Museum. And when she is not writing she enjoys the outdoors, mostly by hiking, biking, and walking, and the indoors by reading in her living room in front of a fire.
