Customer Reviews

Sweet Water

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

An interesting near-miss by a Middlebury College professor with now and then stories set in a resort hotel in a remote valley in Vermont. The then story takes place from 1870 to 1915, focusing on the innkeeper's unmarried daughter who specializes in "water cures" and keeps the hotel running after her father's death. Not until a secret cache of letters and diaries is found almost a century later does anyone learn of Lucinda Dearborn's secret but celibate romance with O, an expatriate American novelist modeled on Henry James. The now story is circa-1998 contemporary, focusing on Greta Dene who with her husband has turned the decrepit resort hotel into a rambling summer home. Like Lucinda, Greta Dene has a secret lover whose accidental death sends her into an emotional tailspin which sets the plot in motion. I found the then story more compelling because the reticence of the characters to seize the day seemed more believable in Victorians. In the now story, Kramer crammed in so many separate elements of plot and character that the story felt disjointed to me. I never really clicked with any of the now characters, who seemed weirdly out-of-time - their emotional baggage seemed more in keeping with the Victorian era than the late 20th century. The book starts very slowly - tons of interior monologue and no action to speak of - but really picks up in the second half, suggesting that Kramer might be able to appeal to a more commercial audience if she can figure out how to make something happen while she's setting up her story.