#30Authors Day 8: Cynthia Swanson Recommends At the Water’s Edge

Posted September 8, 2015 in Blogger Events / 0 Comments

I participated in #30Authors last year and couldn’t be more excited to be joining in again. I’m playing host to Cynthia Swanson, author of The Bookseller, and don’t forget to check out the other 29 authors and bloggers taking part by visiting the event page on The Book Wheel. Keep reading so that you don’t miss out on a MEGA 18 book giveaway!

#30Authors Day 8 is over at @MyNovelOpinion. Visit now to see which book @CynSwanAuthor is recommending.… Click To Tweet

ABOUT #30AUTHORS

#30Authors is an annual event connecting readers, authors, and bloggers. Throughout the month of September, 30 authors review their favorite books on 30 blogs in 30 days. The event has been met with incredible support from and success within the literary community. In the six months following the event’s inaugural launch, the concept was published as an anthology by Velvet Morning Press (Legacy: An Anthology). Started by The Book Wheel, #30Authors remains active throughout the year and you can join in the fun by following along on Twitter at @30Authors, using the hashtag, #30Authors, or purchasing the anthology. To learn more about the event and to see the full schedule, please click here.

Transformation of Character in At the Water’s Edge

By Cynthia Swanson, author of The Bookseller: A Novel

Recently I had lunch with a friend who was telling me about a life-changing transformation she’d experienced. At one time, she was a young newlywed who strongly objected to same-sex marriage. Now she’s a passionate supporter of marriage equality. Why the change? Because she met and got to know someone who’s gay, happily married, and a mother. “All my life, I’d bought into something that turned out to be completely false,” my friend said. “Seeing how joyful she is in her marriage, how fantastic her kids are – it changed my viewpoint entirely.”

I mention this because the same premise is at work in the transformation of Maddie Hyde, the main character in Sara Gruen’s At the Water’s Edge. While the circumstances are dissimilar from my friend’s, Maddie also learns, through bonding with people she initially feels little connection to, that “different” is not so different after all.

When we first meet Maddie, it’s New Year’s Eve, 1944. Maddie, a young Philadelphia socialite, brings beauty, wit, and charm to her marriage to Ellis Hyde – as well as the possibility of a future inheritance, as she’s the sole heir to her estranged father’s fortune.

Ellis and his pal Hank are both 4-F and thus ineligible for military service. In order to prove their usefulness, they decide to go to Scotland in search of the Loch Ness monster. Ellis believes this will achieve two goals: giving him something meaningful to do while others are in combat, and – if he triumphs – getting him back in the good graces of his father, who went on his own unsuccessful (and, some might add, rather shady) quest of the monster some years before.

With Maddie along, the trio makes its way across the Atlantic and lands in a small town on the edge of the Loch. While Ellis and Hank commence their search, Maddie gets to know the townsfolk, particularly the employees of the inn where she and the two young men are staying. Even as Ellis admonishes her for “becoming familiar with the help,” Maddie finds herself drawn to the innkeeper and the two women who work for him, all of whom have their own stories of hardship and sorrow.

What I love about this book is how Maddie changes over time. She doesn’t become saintly, but she does learn that life exists outside her little bubble. In doing so, she discovers her own authentic self. And – as my friend did in getting to know someone outside her circle – Maddie learns that she has more in common with those around her than differences.

I’ve been a Gruen fan since reading Water for Elephants, years ago. I found At the Water’s Edge to be the same type of page-turning historical novel – filled with flawed but intriguing characters and a setting I knew little about prior to reading the book. I look forward to accompanying Gruen on her next fictional journey, wherever that takes her as author and me as reader.

ABOUT CYNTHIA

Cynthia Swanson is an author and a designer. Her debut novel The Bookseller (Harper) was published to critical acclaim in March 2015. She has published short fiction in numerous journals and has been a Pushcart Prize nominee. Cynthia lives in Denver, Colorado with her husband and children. You can reach her and learn more at www.integritymodern.com.