Bulls Island CD [Audiobook, Unabridged] [Audio CD]

Dorothea Benton Frank (Author), Julia Gibson (Reader), Joey Collins (Reader)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 8, 2008

A satisfying tale of honor, chance, and star-crossed love infused with Southern wit, grace, and charm from the New York Times bestselling author Dorothea Benton Frank

After twenty years, Elizabeth "Betts" McGee has finally managed to put her past behind her. She hasn't been home to beautiful South Carolina and untouched Bulls Island since the tragic night that ended her engagement to Charleston's golden boy, J. D. Langley.

And why is that? Really, this is the story of two old Southern families. The Langley family has more money than the Morgan Stanley Bank. And they think they have more class. The Barrett family made their nineteenth-century fortune in a less distinguished manner—corner grocery stores and liquor stores. It's no surprise that when J.D.

and Betts fall in love and decide to marry their parents are none too pleased. And when the love affair comes to an end, everyone is ready to place blame.

Now twenty years have gone by and Betts, a top investment bank executive, must leave her comfortable life in New York City to return to the home she thought she'd left behind forever. But spearheading the most important project of her career puts her back in contact with everything she's tried so hard to forget: her estranged sister, her father, J.D., and her past.

Once she's home, can Betts keep the secret that threatens all she holds dear? Or will her fear of the past wreck her future happiness? And what about that crazy gator? All will be revealed on Bulls Island.

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Will romance triumph over the feud between the aristocratic Langleys and the slightly lower-in-social-pecking-order McGees in Frank's latest Southern charm–filled romp? Though the answer is obvious from the get-go, the author fills this spirited tale with well-drawn characters, not the least of whom is formidable Charleston doyenne Louisa Langley. Betts McGee and J.D. Langley are uneasily headed to the altar—Louisa has a hard time with her son dating down. When Betts's mother dies in a car wreck, a generations-old grudge—abetted by Louisa—flares up, and Betts flees to Manhattan. There, she raises her son (J.D. didn't know she was pregnant when she left) solo and thrives in the distressed property turn-around business for a good 20 years until an assignment sends her back to Charleston to help develop a former wildlife refuge. The local partner in the venture is none other than J.D., who is now unhappily married and childless. Frank steers through several terrains with great aplomb as the story unfolds from both Betts's and J.D.'s points of view. Frank shines as Betts finds out if there's really no place like home. (May)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review

“A warming female-empowerment tale with a side order of southern magic.” (Kirkus Reviews on The Christmas Pearl ) --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Audio CD
• Publisher: HarperAudio; Unabridged edition (April 8, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061582913
• ISBN-13: 978-0061582912
• Product Dimensions: 6.1 x 5.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (68 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,663,921 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I am the author of eleven novels placed in and around the Lowcountry of South Carolina and thanking God for my chance to speak. When I'm not writing, I'm reading or gardening or cooking. Love to travel, shoot the bull with people and most of all, be with my husband, children and dogs - not always necessarily in that order. Just finished my eleventh book - Lowcountry Summer for William Morrow and it will come out June 15, 2010. Love to have company so come visit at www.dotfrank.com. And by the way, serious huge gushing thanks for everything - your kind words and emails. Writing saves me, but without your support it wouldn't mean much. (So I'm a little sappy and sentimental - big deal.) xxoo Dot

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

62 of 65 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Secrets and Lies..., April 8, 2008

By 

Dianne E. Socci-Tetro "Books & Chat" (Connecticut, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Bulls Island (Hardcover)

I'm not a 'professional reviewer', I'm just a very avid reader, so please keep this in mind when you read this review.

A very brief summary of this book - The main characters of this book are "Betts" McGee and J D Langley who, when we meet them 19 years ago are very young and very much in love. Through a tragic event on the day they become engaged, they seperate, Betts leaves South Carolina and breaks off from her family and JD. Moving forward 19 years and the true story starts.
This book is filled with a variety of emotional upheavals - I laughed through many chapters and cried through the same number, but the one thing you can't get around is everyone in this novel carries some kind of secret. Secrets and lies - this is the glue that seems to hold these two families together for bettter or worse. Ms. Franks writes with a vividness and Southern style that makes you want to be sitting on your front porch sippin' at a Mint Julep while you watch the 'gators slowly swim by in the murky river.

JD and Betts are thrown together again after 19 years when Betts, now a high-powered New Yorker, whose job it is to evaluate and restructure distressed properties for her company, finds herself forced to work on a project back home in South Carolina with Langley Developement , AND J D Langley on the Bulls Island project. Secrets and lies, and Betts seems to be hiding the bigggest secret and telling the largest lies.

I was more than half-way through this book, before Ms Frank started to make me worry that the secrets will remain untold and the lies would remain un-apologized for...more chapters went by and I started to gnaw at my finger-nails thinking she could never pull this off. Just when i thought I couldn't stand another moment of suspence it happened...Betts secret is out. I read the last chapters with much skepticism thinking that the ending was just too pat, too easy...too false. But thank God for the epilogue. It sealed the deal in making this a perfect beach -read and for making me go to the bookstore to pick up all Ms.
Franks books to add to my collection.

On a side note - In the first quarter of the book, Betts does have a bit of a fling with someone so totally out of her comfort zone, that I had to wonder why Ms. Franks bothered. But, the pieces seem to fall together in the last chapters and I see why she had Betts do
something so out of character!

I also wanted to let you know that I was so impressed and amused and happy with this book, that I immediately went out and bought 3 more by this author.

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Case of the Incomplete Heroine, May 3, 2008

By 

Antoinette Klein (Hoover, Alabama USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Bulls Island (Hardcover)

Just when you thought you couldn't go another minute without a Dot Frank novel, she gifts her readers with the perfect beach book. The charm of the Carolina low country is facing a crisis, and our native-born heroine, now residing in New York City, returns home to deal with the new venture, estranged family, and the former fiancé she never forgot.

Betts McGee hasn't been home in twenty years. A tragic event and a dark secret sent her away, but when her successful career sets her on the path home, Betts must face a past she not only longs for but also fears to face.

Told in the intimate first-person style by Betts and occasionally by former fiancé J.D. Langley, the story moves toward the expected conclusion with a few tiny twists along the way. The problem is that Betts is not an entirely sympathetic character mainly because we see her as a highly successful career woman dining at New York's finest (Per Se, Grammercy Tavern, etc.) and living in a posh condo with numerous amenities. We don't see but rather hear in retrospect, the way those lost twenty years played out, the struggles she must have had and the torments that must have plagued her guilty conscience. So, Betts is not an easy person to sympathize with, though I'm sure a fuller picture of her would have corrected this if only the author had given us a more intimate look at her immediately after the events that threw her world into chaos. By skipping ahead twenty years, we get a successful woman who once upon a time had a problem. Of course, the "problem" reappears and must be dealt with. Again, Betts gets off rather lightly and the negative feelings towards her are pretty much skipped over until all is calm and she is reassured she is forgiven for her youthful errors in judgement.

That aside, the book is still well worth reading, as are all books by Dot Frank. However, I guess I was expecting a more tear-jerking saga about this particular problem that has been the source of so many heart-wrenching movies from the 40's and 50's. Dot Frank chose to keep it light and not make you cry in your pina colada while chilling on the beach....and maybe she had the right idea.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Characters don't ring true, April 20, 2008

By 

S. Ragsdale "Shelves Full" (Des Moines, IA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Bulls Island (Hardcover)

With a great plot one would expect the author to conjure up characters the reader might care about. Sadly, this "lowcountry" novel falls way short of the Pat Conroy tradition.

Perhaps it is the protagonist's voice that doesn't ring true or maybe it is the bizarre phonetic southern drawl pasted on some of the characters, but this really isn't a very good book.