Babies, Bikes and Broads: The third book in the Cat Rising series
Posted by Levon in Books, tags: book
Babies, Bikes and Broads: The third book in the Cat Rising series
Tragedy-and her brother’s midnight plea for help with his young twins-pulls Cat Hood back home to Galway, North Carolina, in the third book in the popular Cat Rising trilogy.
After five years in Scotland, the place where she’d expected to find both roots and family, Cat is still single (officially), turning forty, and perhaps even more confused and unsettled than when she left North Carolina.
There are good reasons to stay in Galway-and to leave: Her niece, just as angry and independent and contrary as Cat was at that age, is hardly welcoming. Eager as Cat was to reconnect with her best Galway friends, Lily and Hannah, she finds them nearly unrecognizable-and nearly intolerable-given the mad gusto with which they’ve embraced parenthood. And then there’s the reappearance of her high school sweetie and all the bitter memories-and current confusion-her very presence evokes.
But Scotland isn’t an easy answer either, and Cat begins to rethink her return when Isobel, once again, refuses to choose between her husband and Cat.
But one thing is clear: Wherever happiness lies, Cat, being Cat, will resist it with every ounce of her being.
Cynn Chadwick has made her home in the South for twenty years. Prior to earning her MA in literature and MFA in fiction at Goddard College, she worked for one of the first women in the United States to become a master carpenter, an experience that continues to inform her writing. She teaches creative writing. Visit her website at www.CynnChadwick.com.
Customer Review: ANOTHER great story!
Cynn Chadwick has managed to bring us a third book in the Cat Rising series and it is every bit as good as the first and second. Everyone is a little older, a little more experienced and a little more mature and surely they have all changed a bit so when Cat returns home from Ireland she feels a bit detached. The death of a family member and the per chance meeting of an old love/friend and commitment issues in Ireland are influencing Cat’s decision to return to Ireland or stay home. Cat is faced with making this decision considering factors based on family, first loves and commitment to what is really important in life. If you haven’t read these three books, you are truly missing out.
Customer Review: Coming Home
Cat Rising: The first in the Cat Rising seriesGirls With Hammers: The second in the Cat Rising series
Cat Hood is finally coming home after five years abroad in Scotland. For the fan of this excellent series, reading Babies, Bikes, and Broads also feels like coming home to a community of friends and family. Author Cynn Chadwick has created a place, the little town of Galway in the hills of North Carolina, filled with characters we’ve come to know and love, from the slightly mysterious Arlo, to quirky Sophia, Cat’s friend and neighbor Delores, Cat’s best friend Lily, brother Will.
Cat is summoned home due to a death in the family. She is settled in Scotland; she will make a quick trip, do what is necessary, and leave again. At least that’s the plan. Her sister-in-law’s death leaves her brother with five-year-old twins to raise alone. Cat doesn’t like kids. Even best friend Lily has become a mother. Everywhere Cat turns, there are babies, it seems. Cat feels surrounded by changes she can’t adjust to, or doesn’t want to accept. A quick retreat seems best.
Of course, family ties have a way of entangling us even when we don’t want them to. The reappearance of an old girlfriend also complicates Cat’s decision. Her growing affection for the twins lends weight to the ties that bind, while those that reach across the Atlantic seem to grow slimmer each day. As usual, Cat is the last one to see her choices clearly.
Chadwick is a skilled writer. You’ll find humor and love, grief, laughter, tears, old betrayals and new challenges, all handled as deftly as Cat handles her carpentry tools, as if they fit in the hand comfortably. I hope she lets us visit Galway again someday.
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