Along Came Mary : A Bad Girl Creek Novel (Hardcover)

by Jo-Ann Mapson (Author) "EXCEPT FOR TWO BOYS hyped up about tonight's rodeo, the bleachers at Five Corners stood empty..." (more)
Key Phrases: flower farm, New Mexico, Bad Girls, Beryl Anne (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
This follow-up to Mapson's popular Bad Girl Creek introduces a new face to the spirited gang of hard-luck women running a California flower farm. Mary Madigan ("Maddy") Caringella is a rodeo performer who decides to leave her job (and her boozy singing partner and boyfriend) and travel across the country, taking part in karaoke competitions. In Oklahoma City, she hooks up with Rick Heinrich, a fiercely independent middle-aged journalist. While the two are in New Mexico, they meet Beryl Anne, an ex--Bad Girl who's now touring the country with her guitarist beau. In various ways, Maddy and Rick's lives become entwined with the lives of the women of Bad Girl Creek, and eventually they make their way to the farm itself, encountering some rough patches in their relationship along the way. The book is told in the voices of several characters, primarily Maddy, Rick, Beryl and Phoebe, the founder of the flower farm-she is now pregnant and facing a life-threatening delivery. Mapson gives updates on other Bad Girls as well: Ness is learning to live with HIV and Nance is fighting her anorexia, even as she plans a wedding to Phoebe's brother, James, and pines for her old love. Maddy is an appealingly saucy protagonist, though her voice gradually loses its distinctiveness and blends with that of the other narrators (who tend to sound alike) as the book wears on. The story is as sentimental as its precursor, but those who enjoyed the female bonding and entrepreneurial antics of the Bad Girls will be pleased with this chatty sequel. Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club alternate.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Fans of Bad Girl Creek will no doubt enjoy reuniting with Phoebe, now pregnant and grieving for her fianc , killed on their wedding day; Ness, who appears to be in remission from AIDS; Beryl Anne, totally in love with Earl, the perfect man, but still dealing with the emotional scars from her time in jail for accidentally killing her husband; and Nancy, engaged to Phoebe's brother James but struggling with a serious eating disorder. They will also enjoy meeting the new (and equally damaged) characters, who include Rick, a 50-year-old writer who's never grown up and, coincidentally, was a primary cause of Nancy's anorexia, and Mary Madigan, an alcoholic singer mourning her twin sister's death in the Oklahoma City bombing. But newcomers to Mapson will be in for a disappointment. Melodrama abounds (this is like an old-timey radio soap opera), and the novel also suffers from being told from multiple viewpoints; as it is, the characters are paper-thin, and with so many of them crowding the pages, it's nearly impossible to distinguish one voice from another. This is definitely not Mapson's best book (that would be Blue Rodeo) and should be purchased only for demand.
--Nancy Pearl, Washington Ctr. for the Book, Seattle
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster; large print edition (December 24, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743224612
• ISBN-13: 978-0743224611
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.6 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,195,441 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Gal_Pal Book, March 9, 2003

By	BeachReader "readerjb" (Delaware) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

Although about half of the events in this book took place at the flower farm on the central California coast, much of it followed the travels of Mary Madigan and "Rotten Rick" as they wound their way west from Oklahoma to the coast. The reader knows that a connection will be made but not exactly how.

I was glad to revisit the women of Bad Girl Creek and catch up on their lives. Poor Phoebe is dealing (and not very well) with a personal disaster while Beryl has moved to Alaska with Earl.

Mapson must have great relationships with some really great girlfriends because she has wonderful insight into women's friendships and how women provide unquestioned support for each other.

I love reading and getting lost in this author's stories. As one reviewer said, "you don't just read her books, you take up residence in them." This is so true....... I always feel like I am there, participating in the lives of the well-developed characters, feeling their joy and their pain.

A great read that I hated to finish!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Along Came Mary~, January 9, 2003

By	Sandra Mitchell "Sandra Mitchell" (Chicago, IL United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

In Along Came Mary, Mapson brings us back once again to the girls of Bad Girl Creek and their delightful flower farm. The girls are all back, and the sense of sisterhood that Mapson captured in Bad Girl Creek is just as strong. The girls will go through some more ups and downs, but their friendships will help them prevail.

Along Came Mary also introduces us to two new characters Mary Madigan & Rotten Rick. The only disappointment I felt while reading Along Came Mary was that the majority of the book seemed to focus on Maddy & Rick, instead of the girls at the flower farm. I enjoyed Bad Girl Creek a little more for this reason, as I loved the focus of Nance, Phoebe, Ness & Beryl that Bad Girl Creek had. Despite this, Mapson still maintains her gift for writing, and has you feeling all of the joys and pains that her characters go through, as if they were actually happening to you or your closest friend. I can't wait for the next book, so I can return to these women who have become friends~

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It can't get any better than this novel, January 4, 2003

By	J. Robinson (Thousand Oaks, CA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I am a huge Mapson fan and was looking forward to her new book. What ended up happening with this one, like all the others, was that I couldn't put it down until I finished. The bad girls are back and better than ever, and surprisingly, "Rotten Rick" is also back! The setting, the problems (and resolutions) these women have, and the story of Rick and Maddy was just so well-written, it felt real to me. What I found the most interesting was the points of view it was written from--in "Bad Girl Creek," it alternated between the points of view of all the women; in this book, it took a different twist and alternated between Phoebe, Beryl, Rick, and Maddy. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who wants to read about brave, feisty women and one man who eventually shows that he's not rotten. Definite two-plus thumbs up!