Customer Reviews

Fireworks

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I have always considered this book to be one of Elizabeth White's best. Part of that, I suppose, is that I have lived in Mobile all my life and felt right at home with this book. However, the combination of mystery, romance and christian influence make for some very interesting reading.
Elizabeth White has many great books, but this is my favorite!

This is a great mystery and Christian exploration. These two characters really offer a lot to a reader. You get the long time Christian in Quinn and the new Christian in Susannah. The fireworks investigation is enjoyable and runs along smoothly. There are some surprises along with the plot line - I definitely didn't see the ending coming! I do wish we would have gotten more information from Jana from Fair Game (Quinn's sister), though as I'm a HUGE fan of continuity and series! Definitely a great book for summer time reading!

This enjoyable book proved a quick read. The straightforward way the story is laid out allows the reader to zip through it in no time. I learned a bit about pyrotechnics--fireworks--how they're assembled. I feel that's a bonus!

The character of Susannah is a bit of a stretch. She's presented as a novice to church attendance, yet she has a nagging brother who is a long-time believer, married to a believer. I feel that even though she may never have attended a church, she would have heard more of the language of church people from her brother and sister-in-law. In spite of that, I liked Susannah. In fact, I liked Quinn too, the super shy thirty-year-old bachelor who is immediately attracted to the Yankee. Another interesting character is the city of Mobile, AL. Although I've never visited, I now feel familiar with the city. The landlady, Elva Kay, makes a hummingbird cake that sounds so yummy, I actually Goggled it and found the recipe!

There are just enough hints in the plot for this reader to figure out the twist, which I suppose means its not twisted enough. The ending is drawn out a bit, but some will appreciate the final fireworks display.

ok I've got 2 say this wasn't the type of book that you just can't put down. It was a little slow at times, but, I have to disagree with the negative reviewers that get the book for FREE then complain that the book was too religous. It was Free....If you think it's boring or has too many references to the bible then just delete it. You have not lost anything, it was FREE. I myself like to read about characters who have strong christian values. I don't want to read smut and read cursing, ect. The story makes me desire to be more fruitful in my christian walk, like the characters in this book, instead of standing on the sideline and just saying "I'm a christian". Reading the story made me desire to have that joy of leading someone to the Lord. All heaven rejoices when one soul comes to the Truth & knowledge of Christ. I admire the author for writting a faith based book. And by the way, I also disagree with one of the reviewer who said that it was too easy when Susannah gave her life over to God. It is easy coming to Jesus. It was for me anyway. I was wild & carefree and I didn't need anyone. I had my whole life under control, so I thought, but the Holy spirit spoke to my heart, alot like Susannah in this book. So I do know for a fact that you can be heading one direction and then God can do a "Suddenly" and totally tur you around.

I got this book free on Kindle and I was really disappointed with it. I read the first few chapters and was pretty bored. So I skimmed the rest of the book. Skimming the book and getting it for free is the only reason why I gave it two stars.

The good: The only really good thing about this book is that it's clean.

The bad: The characters in this book were completely two dimensional and unbelievable. Susannah supposedly had a Masters in chemistry but she didn't sound intelligent and did some pretty stupid things in the book. She was a horrible investigator. Her love interest was insanely perfect and therefore annoying. The dialog felt forced most of the time and was very unrealistic. I laughed a lot while reading this book (and it wasn't at parts that were meant to be funny). The book came off as way too "preachy" for my taste. The storyline fell flat in my opinion.

I would not recommend reading this book. Skim it if you're insanely bored and you can get this book free... But do so at your own risk!

FIREWORKS is, in the main, a salvation story imbedded in a romance that's part Southwestern-Gal-in-Alabama/fish-out-of-water tale blended with a leisurely-solved mystery.( It's pretty easy to figure out who did what and even why.)

FIREWORKS opens with a scary pyrotechnic mishap that nearly kills Quinn Baldwin, the owner of the company staging the show. No one is hurt, but a lot of damage is done to a key civic edifice. Even though authorities call the mishap an "accident," the insurance company receives an anonymous letter saying otherwise. And so, pretty, blond, leggy Susannah Tait, multi-degreed explosives expert and investigator, is dispatched to find out what happened and, her boss hopes, nail Quinn so that the insurance company is off the hook moolah-wise.

The rest of the novel is a strolling Christian romance. Quinn and Susannah get to know each other, while, Susannah's deceit becomes a burden. (She befriends Quinn to get info, slips into his circle of friends, and must hold up her deception.)She falls under the spell of the man, the city, the people, the donuts, and the God who hovers over her life like a lover waiting to be noticed.

To non-Christians, this novel will come across as decidedly preachy. Almost every significant character--from her landlady to her brother (who only shows up via phone calls)--is a strong believer, and all of these are out to get Susannah converted.

Outsiders don't understand the evangelistic fervor we Southern Evangelicals can display in real life. Within the confines of a novel that, naturally, compresses major incidents, having a good percentage of the scenes relate to getting Susannah to surrender to Jesus could leave a less than devout reader feeling a bit overwhelmed, religiously speaking.

However, once I said to myself, "Okay, the real romance here is between Susannah and the God who is wooing her through his people, not between Susannah and Quinn," I was able to settle enjoyably into the tale. That's the key. Tell yourself, "This is a God-courting-Susannah story." It will fall into place. That's what the marketing should have been. The romance with Quinn has its own secondary place, and the mystery is a straggling third on the list.

It took me well past a third into the book to feel the spell of the romance(s). Quinn is just too perfect in the early part. It's when we start seeing his vulnerability--his first fib, even--that we can connect. Ah, see, he's human. Susannah is likable, although I hated that she was turned into something of a "Southern Girly-Girl". I understand the metaphor the author is using there, but it was nice to have her be the natural beauty without regard for the rituals of prettied up femininity.

Susannah, btw, makes some serious missteps that made me question if she deserved all those educational letters after her name. One especially huge error, professionally speaking, is particularly annoying, and seemed to be a plot contrivance to allow her to hold off some information until the very end. But by then, I very much liked this young couple, as well as the older Elva May, and I also had a small fondness for the quirky secretary and Skeet and Dana. I liked spending a bit of time with the group.

Beth White has a smooth, uncluttered style of writing. It doesn't force metaphors. It doesn't attempt stylistic flights. It's a gentle, clean style that will suit a quiet afternoon or evening's reading when your mood is matched by a novel that doesn't rush, doesn't offer anything offensive, and walks you unhurriedly beside a young woman as she encounters all sorts of new loves--God's love, a good man's love, the love of a faith community.

This is a novel of a woman finding her place, and it's about a man learning lessons about forgiveness, even as both of them learn that what God brings into one's life, even when it seems awful, may ultimately turn out for a whole lotta good.

Lovers of sweet Christian romances should enjoy this novel quite a bit. The romance is believable. The first kiss is utterly exhilirating and delightful to read. The book and its author, I believe, seek to honor a very traditional faith experience--an unsullied and honorable progression from unbelief to belief, from non-love to love--and it succeeds at that.

If this is the sort of gentle read you gravitate to, I recommend it. For me, ie. someone who prefers more extreme fiction, it provided a few hours of tenderness and uncomplicated storytelling. And that's not at all a bad thing now and then . . . for anyone.

Mir's rating of the various components of FIREWORKS:
The mystery: 2.5 stars
The romance: 3.5 stars
The spiritual journey: 4 stars

OVERALL RATING: 3.5 out o 5 stars

Mir
[...]

This story was fairly well written, but it was rather bland and forgettable, and most of the characters never came to life for me. This was the best line from the book: "A couple of years ago she'd come face-to-fang with a diamondback rattler in her garage. Though diamondbacks were a protected species in Arizona, the snake had somehow managed to commit suicide on the end of her shovel."

The author almost lost me very early in the book (10%, or location 495 in my Kindle) when Quinn and Susannah are in a Krispy Kreme doughnut shop in Mobile, Alabama and Quinn says, "This is where the chain started. We're talking the real deal." In fact, the first Krispy Kreme doughnut store was in Winston Salem, North Carolina, and is still in business today - or at least it was when I stopped there for doughnuts on my last trip to the States in July of 2009. That made me doubt the veracity of the other "facts" in the book, but I decided not to worry about the fine points of pyrotechnics and simply enjoy the story.

If you're looking for a light, easy read and don't mind an over-riding theme of Christianity, you'll enjoy the book.

I had no idea when I purchased this book that it was Christian in any way, but there is no doubt now that I have finished it that there is definately a southern Christian influence. Don't get me wrong I liked the book and I am a Christian myself I was just suprised to find it to be such when nothing I read indicated that it was. Good romance story not your typical that is for sure, but all the same good.

This is the first book I've read by Elizabeth White and I was hooked from the first page. The story made you want to laugh, cry, kiss someone you love, kick something and hang the villian by his toes!!!... you name it, the author brough them all together. Going on line right now to find more by Ms. White.

This book took me longer to get through then most books but it was very well written and funny. It was hard for me to like Susannah throughout most of the book but at the end she gets a good dose of character. I loved that it was set in the south! I definatly suggest reading this book.