4 Stars for Swimming Home Ruth Mancini

Summary:

Lizzie’s life hasn’t exactly gone to plan. Eighteen years ago, she made the difficult decision to leave London for Paris to escape her best friend’s fiancé, the man who’d attacked her and turned her world upside down. Secure in the belief that she and her daughter, Helena, are now safe from harm, Lizzie contemplates her future. But is the nightmare really over?

When the captivating Sky Donoghue comes along, pulling Helena into dangerous waters, Lizzie’s strength and judgment are put to the test. Just how far should she go to save her daughter? How far will she go to save hers?

Review:

Usually I pick a book because the concept is unusual, or for shallow reasoning like the cover speaks to me, and the title is clever. Swimming Home by Ruth Mancini did none of this. I chose Mancini’s book because I’m a protective mother to my own daughter. In the story, Lizzie and her daughter, Helena, which by the way is my daughter’s name, have lived a happy life together with Lizzie as a single mom struggling to give Helena the things she needs and desires. Lizzie, is a strong character that is easily admired from the very beginning. The story spends a lot of time in Lizzie’s head which is often repetitive and drawn-out. This is the only reason I gave it a four star rating. Everything else worked.

            The plot twists and turns felt like ‘Winter’ in Antonio Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and ending in his ‘Spring’. The foreshadowing in the beginning of this story paralleled an icy rain outside a house constructed in glass, that feeling is how I feel when I listen to Winter by Vivaldi. It traps me, keeping me inside my own fear and unable to act. This was Lizzie, so afraid the horror that happened to her would also happen to her Helena. Mancini did a fantastic job of filling the reader with this ominous tone. It’s why I kept reading, rooting for Lizzie.

As I said, she was a great character, well-developed with other characters that highlighted her through love and friendship in a real way I found enriching. Lizzie’s friends were flawed like herself, accepting and understanding her through their own narrow flawed view points. Lizzie’s romantic interest(s) felt the same way, but geared itself towards larger trepidation and guilt. All of these, plot, characters, lastly the intense literary device of foreshadowing worked splendidly for me. I read it in two days. I highly recommend this book, a thrilling romance.