Distant Shores [Hardcover]

Kristin Hannah (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: 2002

Hardback LARGE PRINT fiction

Product Details

• Hardcover: 565 pages
• Publisher: Ballantine Publishing Group (2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0739428624
• ISBN-13: 978-0739428627
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (44 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,950,165 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Kristin Hannah was born in September 1960 in Southern California and grew up at the beach, making sand castles and playing in the surf. When she was eight years old, her father drove the family to Western Washington which they called home.

After working in a trendy advertising agency, Kristin decided to go to law school. "But you're going to be a writer" are the prophetic words she would never forget from her mother. Kristin was in her third-and final-year of law school and her mom was in the hospital, facing the end of her long battle with cancer. Kristin was shocked to discover that her mother believed she would become a writer. For the next few months, they collaborated on the worst, most clichéd historical romance ever written.

After her mom's death, she packed up all those bits and pieces of paper they'd collected and put them in a box in the back of her closet. Kristin got married and continued practicing law.

Then Kristin found out she was pregnant and was on bed rest for five months. By the time she'd read every book in the house and started asking her husband for cereal boxes to read, she knew she was a goner. That's when her husband reminded her of the book she'd started with her mom. Kristin pulled out the boxes of research material, dusted them off and began writing. By the time their son was born, she'd finished a first draft and found an obsession.

The rejections came, of course, and they stung for a while, but each one really just spurred her to try harder, work more. In 1990, Kristin got "the call," and in that moment, she went from a young mother with a cooler-than-average hobby to a professional writer, and has never looked back. In all the years between then and now, she have never lost her love of, or her enthusiasm for, telling stories. Kristin feels truly blessed to be a wife, a mother, and a writer.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful, soul-searching novel, July 23, 2002

By 

R. Pride "rpride9485" (Cleveland, Ohio United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Distant Shores (Hardcover)

Jack and Elizabeth "Birdie" Shore are at a crossroads. After 24 years of marriage, they have raised two beautiful girls and withered the storm of Jack's rise and fall as a football star and his addiction to pain killers. Now Jack's career as a sportscaster is rising, and on the outside, everything looks perfect. But Elizabeth feels she is losing herself. She has raised her children, lifted Jack when he stumbled, and forgiven him for the times he strayed earlier in their marriage. She gave up her dream of becoming a painter because she thought that was what she was supposed to do. But when he beloved father dies suddenly, she realizes how empty her life truly is. And when Jack takes a job that will take him to New York, Elizabeth, for the first time, doesn't follow him and remains in Oregon, hoping to find what will give her her own identity.

Distant Shores is a wonderful, soul searching novel about two people who have lost their way. They're not bad people, and they haven't done terrible things. They still love each other, but as times change and they become different people, they wonder if they love each other enough. Few writers get to the heart of this as well as Kristin Hannah. You will sympathize with both Jack and Elizabeth, understand both their points of view, and hope they will find their way back to each other before it's too late. Very highly recommended.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Ho Hum, June 1, 2005

By 

Wendy Kaplan (Houston) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Distant Shores (Audio Cassette)

Maybe I would have liked this book better if I had not suffered through the egregious unabridged audio, with singularly untalented reader Bernadette Quigley, who, throughout the entire book, put her inflections on the wrong words as though she were reciting by rote rather than looking at what she was reading. Example, "Thank you," Elizabeth SAID.

Once having gotten used to that weirdness, one is blown away by the plethora of cliches contained in only one small book. Middle-aged woman faces empty nest and boredom in her marriage. Husband wants something more. Wife wants to "find herself." College-age bratty daughters want mom and dad to stay together forever so they feel secure.

The middle-aged wife, Elizabeth, was once a promising painter, but of course she got married and gave up painting and yada yada yada...husband Jack was once a star quarterback, but "blew out his knee" and got addicted to painkillers, so now he's a third-string TV commentator in Oregon. He yearns to be back in the bigtime. Yawn. Daughters are polar opposites, but both at Georgetown University, sharing a room (as if!!). Back in Tennessee, Elizabeth's Daddy is almost a mockery of grade C Southern Tobacco Grower movies. Stepmother Anita has piled up hair and high heeled shoes and Elizabeth hates her.

Enough. This is probably an OK book to read on a boring plane ride or better yet, when stuck in the airport. But don't expect a single original thought or word.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Story of a Stale Marriage, December 26, 2002

By 

Mamalinde "mamalinde" (Dallas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Distant Shores (Hardcover)

Yes, it happens, and this author gets just a whole lot of it EXACTLY right. I do wish I could have LIKED Elizabeth (Birdie) Shore a little better, "poor little misunderstood rich girl" comes to mind here, though. The Jackson Shore character really didn't have much depth to him beyond himself and his beloved sports. Did he ever really "get it"? Some of the women characters were richly sketched, and the daughters were artfully portrayed as a study in contrasts. The setting on the Oregon coast was well detailed and occasionally breathtaking but does it match the rather tropical looking cover of the book? Just a lot of bits and pieces that did not work for me - the single handed destruction of the dining room wall being one of them. Some of the rough language seems to come from no where and seems unnecessary and a bit trite. Not a favorite book, but Ms. Hannah does have an interesting spin on the staleness of a marriage, what makes a family, and finding yourself again.