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    The Truth About Love and Lightning: A Novel
    Unavailable
    The Truth About Love and Lightning: A Novel
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    The Truth About Love and Lightning: A Novel
    Ebook307 pages4 hours

    The Truth About Love and Lightning: A Novel

    By Susan McBride

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    The Truth About Love and Lighting is a deliciously emotional story of family, forgiveness, love, and magic from Susan McBride.

    A lie that Gretchen Brink told 40 years ago comes back to haunt her when a tornado brings together Sam, a mysterious man who can’t remember anything, and Abby, her newly pregnant daughter who is convinced Sam is her long-lost father. Though decades old, when Gretchen’s secrets are revealed, the ramifications will affect them all in ways they never could have imagined.

    A mesmerizing study of family and love, The Truth About Love and Lightning is touching and observant, reminding us that we never know when our lives are on the precipice of change.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateFeb 12, 2013
    ISBN9780062027320
    Unavailable
    The Truth About Love and Lightning: A Novel
    Author

    Susan McBride

    Susan McBride is the USA Today bestselling author of Blue Blood and the Debutante Dropout Mysteries that include The Good Girl's Guide to Murder, The Lone Star Lonely Hearts Club, Night of the Living Deb, Too Pretty to Die, and Say Yes to the Death. She also writes the bestselling River Road Mysteries and has penned three women’s fiction titles: The Truth About Love and Lightning, Little Black Dress, and The Cougar Club. She chronicled her bout with breast cancer in the short memoir, In the Pink: How I Met the Perfect (Younger) Man, Survived Breast Cancer, and Found True Happiness After Forty. She lives in St. Louis, Missouri, with her husband and daughter.

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    Reviews for The Truth About Love and Lightning

    3.5/5

    12 ratings12 reviews

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    • 3/5
      What one of us would not like a man whose arrival was heralded by lightning? Although this book has a somewhat predictable plot, the characters are unique, a pair of blind twins with different talents in compensation, a woman with a big secret and her daughter. This was a fun read, somewhat magical in places, with a family value type of lesson, about hope and love. This will appeal to readers who like Sarah Addison Allen and her whimsical stories.
    • 4/5
      I so enjoyed this book. I love the magical aspects, the whole life cycle of the walnut grove, the characters, everything. This author reminds me of Sarah Addison Allen. I found the question of truth to be quite intersting. Is it better to lie or to be blunt and truthful even though it may be hurtful? This is the theme that runs throughout the story. This story is so heartwarming and genuine. I felt these people could be my neighbors. Each character had such an interesting story and woven together created a wonderful book. Is it predictable, yes, but the characters are so great and the stories getting to that ending are well worth the read.
    • 4/5
      This spell binding book of family secrets and lost loved ones, combines rural common sense and charming magic. This novel has fresh, believable characters that burst into life from the first page. Spellbinding and hard to put down.
    • 4/5
      We teach our children that they should never lie, that the truth is always the best option. And usually this is the case. But we can't always explain the gradations of truth and lies or that there are, in fact, some situations where it is kinder to fib than to tell the truth. Sometimes the truth hurts people for no reason and a lie gives them comfort. And who's to say that telling a lie in that case is the wrong thing to do? But lies can have a way of coming back to bite us, even when they are told out of compassion or kindness as Gretchen Brink, in Susan McBride's newest novel The Truth About Love and Lightning, discovers. A freak tornado rips through a small community in Missouri, completely cutting off the farm where Gretchen Brink and her younger, blind sisters Trudy and Bennie live. The sisters' other senses are acute and they not only sense the coming of the physical storm but also the emotional storm roiling in its wake. When inspecting the property for damage, Gretchen finds an injured man under a tree in the long barren, but now inexplicably budding walnut grove. He doesn't know who he is or where he is but she and her sisters quickly come to understand that there's every chance he could be Sam Winston, the man from whose parents Gretchen inherited the farm, who has long been thought dead in Africa, and who Gretchen named as the father of her baby so many years ago. She and Sam had been the closest of friends and although Sam wanted more from her, at seventeen she wasn't interested. After his disappearance while on a mission trip, it gave his parents comfort to believe that Gretchen's baby was Sam's and it gave her a place to shelter after her judgmental and hard mother cast her out for the sin of her pregnancy and so she let everyone believe that Sam was the father. She raised her daughter Abby with that understanding as well, keeping the truth to herself. But now The Man Who Might Be Sam is recovering in her home and Abby is about to show up on her doorstep as well, unexpectedly pregnant and reeling, having run away from the long-time boyfriend who sees no reason to get married but whom she does love deeply. And when Abby arrives, she immediately latches onto the idea that the man in the parlor is in fact Sam, her father, finally come home to her just like she wished for so many years growing up. Over the course of the next few days, the past is evident everywhere on the Winston/Brink farm. From Gretchen's childhood growing up with a harsh and blunt mother who felt that the truth was more important that sparing anyone's feelings to the mystery and mysticism of Sam Winston's grandfather Hank Littlefoot, a shaman who could summon the rain to Abby's childhood and her wish that her mother wouldn't ease the sting of the truth with small, apparently harmless fibs. But if the past and its long concealed secrets swirl around these characters, they must also look forward to their futures. How can they discover who The Man Who Might Be Sam is? What is Abby's plan going forward? Will she tell Nate about the baby and what decisions will they make, together or seperately? Will Gretchen be able to keep the secret of Abby's paternity to herself and spare Abby anger and sadness at the loss of her growing relationship with the man she readily accepts is both Sam and her father? Can Gretchen open her heart to the precious connection she dismissed forty years ago? Although the past cannot be re-written, it can offer guidance and maybe, with the help of an anachronistic storm, it can shine a light on the way forward. McBride has written a story filled with genuine warmth, love, and hope. The idea of truth as something not quite an absolute and the importance of the intention behind a lie is an intriguing one. The characters are charming and the quirky novel moves along well. The use of the past, especially Hank Littlefoot's story, helps to flesh out the present as does the use of multiple narrators. And the thread of magic and belief that runs through the tale adds an unexpected spice to the plot although the ending remains very predictable and the mystery of who the man is is never really in doubt. An easy read, this will appeal greatly to those who like a light bit of magic, family, and love in their women's fiction.
    • 1/5
      I did not enjoy this free book. Characters who are likeable and interesting can be quircky but the characters in this book were just boring. I did not care about the central mystery. I am not sure why so many of the free books have this weird fantasy theme. Skip it. Read something else
    • 5/5
      Did the storm really bring Sam along with it....the Sam who disappeared 40 years ago? As much as Gretchen wanted it to be Sam, she was worried that his return may mean that her secret/her lie would be exposed.Regardless, it couldn't be anyone but Sam especially since it was well known that his ancestors were famous for storms, lightning, and unusual things happening when lightning struck. Could it really have happened again no matter how strange....rain, lightening, and walnuts? Strange things do and have happened at the farmhouse where Sam grew up and where Gretchen and her sisters now lived. Strange things such as ghosts knocking on the front door and now the farmhouse being the only place that had electricity when the entire town had none because of the storm that blew through town the day before with Sam on its coattails.The Truth About Love & Lightening is a book that has lovable, appealing characters with interesting backgrounds. The characters are the basis, the wonder, and the root of what made Ms. McBride's book a marvelous read.Ms. McBride always pleases her readers with a mixture of splendid characters, great story lines, and a little bit of mystery. Waiting for the answer about Sam and also the answer about Gretchen's secret/lie was cleverly and expertly carried out with flashbacks and details of the current lives of the characters. The unhurried way Ms. McBride melts the reader into the suspense of Sam and his family's past and also into each character's feelings and believability makes you turn the pages not in an unhurried pace but at a hurried, curious pace.I really enjoyed the book because of Ms. McBride's smooth, splendid writing style. She glides seamlessly from one period of time to the other and gives you just enough information that you keeps you involved. Don't miss this marvelous read by Susan McBride which also teaches us about love and the wisdom of living our lives where we are now, being happy with what we have now, and not living in the past. 5/5This book was given to me free of charge and without compensation by the publisher and author in exchange for an honest review.
    • 4/5
      I really liked this book. I always enjoy books with a little bit of "magic" in them. The characters were all very interesting. Bennie and Trudy were a fun addition to the story. The author did a good job with all the different generations, the story flowed so smoothly between them. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes Sarah Addison Allen or Alice Hoffman.
    • 4/5
      I really enjoyed this novel. It was fast paced with an emotional story that really pulls you in! I love when author can do a good job flipping from past to present to add depth to the story. McBride did a wonderful job doing just that. I also love that McBride made me believe in magic while reading the book. Overall a great read and I would recommend it.
    • 4/5
      This was a delightful, fast-paced read that superficially seems to deal with family, yet basically deals with the consequences of our choices. The main characters are Gretchen Brink, her daughter Abigail, and her twin sisters Bennie and Trudy. Secondary characters are Sam Winston, his grandfather Hank Littlefoot, Abby's boyfriend Nathan March, and the sheriff Frank Tilby. The author goes back and forth in history to present the story surrounding the family myth of Sam's Native American grandfather and rainmaker, Hank Littlefoot. She also provides us with glimpses into Sam's life after leaving Missouri for missionary work in Africa. The reader is afforded a glimpse into Gretchen's background and provides insight into why she made certain choices in the past and how she has dealt with the guilt as a consequence of those choices. Just as Gretchen, Sam and even Hank must deal with the consequences of their life choices, so must Abby, Nathan and Frank. I found THE TRUTH ABOUT LOVE & LIGHTNING to be a quick read that kept my attention and interest from the first page to the last.
    • 3/5
      This book was essentially told in two parts- one in the present and one in the past. While I enjoyed the present tense story, the past tense story was extremely uninteresting to me. I found myself skimming over these parts. This book is a bit farfetched as well which may have also been why I wasn't too enthusiastic about it. It wasn't the worst read, but it wasn't my favorite, either.
    • 3/5
      Gretchen Brink has been keeping a secret for 40 years and when her pregnant daughter Abby comes to visit and an amnesiac man is found after a tornado drops him in their homestead. Abby is convinced that this man is her long lost father Sam and soon Gretchen is beginning to think so too, but this could reveal the secret that she has kept hidden so long and she is afraid. This a story of love and secrets (although, I figured out the secret long before its unfolding), and was intrigued by the powers of Hank Littlefoot and his power to make it rain, and the importance of knowing this back story to help understand the characters now. The characters are well-developed and likable. I just felt that the secret held for forty years was not a strong reason to keep it a secret. I believe the relationships between Gretchen and her sisters and with her daughter would and could deal with it. Whether, this mysterious man was Sam or not; didn’t matter. The women want him to be the man who they have missed for so long.
    • 5/5
      I have been a huge fan of Susan McBride ever since I read the Cougar Club so I was excited to read her newest novel - The Truth About Love & Lightning. I have to say, I think this is her best book yet! You are drawn into the story from the very beginning and it keeps you enthralled through the last page. The characters are all likeable (except for Gretchen's mom, Annika, and I don't think ANYONE liked her, including her own family), and you feel a deep connection with them all. If you enjoy a good story with a bit of magic thrown in for good measure, then this is the book for you.