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Body Surfing

3.28 of 5 stars 3.28 · rating details · 10,766 ratings · 1,250 reviews

At the age of 29, Sydney has already been once divorced and once widowed. Trying to regain her footing, she has answered an ad to tutor the teenage daughter of a well-to-do couple as they spend a sultry summer in their oceanfront New Hampshire cottage. But when the Edwards's two grown sons, Ben and Jeff, arrive at the beach house, Sydney finds herself caught up in a destru...more

Hardcover, 291 pages

Published April 24th 2007 by Little, Brown and Company

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Feb 26, 2008 Nicole rated it 2 of 5 stars

I wasn't expecting much from this book, and was pleasantly surprised during the first third. Anita Shreve writes with skill, although I could have done without quite as much description of what people are wearing - especially since they change their clothes at least twice a day. But she captures the scene of a WASPy New England family summering on the coast of New Hampshire perfectly.[return]But by the last third, I started wondering whether she knew quite where she was trying to go with the dev...more

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Aug 07, 2008 Christine rated it 1 of 5 stars

Why do I keep reading Anita Shreve? I can't explain this strange relationship I have with her characters. They are my guilty pleasure. More than the love plots (which usually involve infidelity, hmmm) and more than the character development, or lack of....it's her writing style. I love her cadence, her rythmn, and her emotional connections. One of my favorites is Fortune's Rock, which is a twisted sort of love story. But I couldn't put it down. Maybe because the book was set on the water, which...more

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Dec 27, 2008 Katy rated it 3 of 5 stars

If I could give 2.75 stars...... I'm going to give it 3 because I enjoy her style of writing. The book, well, it wasn't all it was hyped up to be. It kept me turning the pages even though I pretty much knew what was going to happen. My mom told me there were some pretty big twists, all which I predicted (which is disappointing-I love to be surprised!).

She didn't develop the characters as well as I would have liked. Why did Mrs. Edwards hate her so much? You can read into the fact that she and M...more

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Dec 15, 2008 Lisa rated it 3 of 5 stars

If we could give half stars, I would probably have given this one a two-and-a-half. I rounded up because I like this author so much. Body Surfing is about a woman who has been married twice: once divorced, once widowed. Coming out of her mourning, she finds herself in a relationship again. This book is about her relationship with the man and the family, and what ultimately happens. Action-wise, this book is not fast. It explores emotions, in that dispassionate, Anita Shreve way, rather than rela...more

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Jan 02, 2009 bookczuk rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: bookcrossing

After having been greatly disappointed by the last couple of Anita Shreve books I've read, I was relieved that this one didn't irritate me. On the other hand, though, it didn't give me the same pleasure as her earliest books did. But it wasn't bad.

The thing that interested me the most, almost, was figuring out that the beach house in this book is the same one in The Pilot's Wife, Fortune's Rock and Sea Glass. In fact, I think the folks in this story were the owners directly after the pilot's wif...more

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Jan 30, 2009 Diane rated it 3 of 5 stars

The setting is a beach house in New Hampshire, the summer home of the Edwards family. Sydney is hired to be the tutor for their "slow" daughter, Julie, while Mr. Edwards is an architect who enjoys his rose garden and collects historical documents on the house they're living in. It is the same house that was featured in several other Shreve novels, like "The Pilot's Wife". Mrs. Edwards strikes me as a snob and a bit of a racist with her remarks about Sydney being half-Jewish. The brothers, Ben an...more

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May 28, 2013 Kim rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: anita-shreve, body-surfing, sibling-rivelry

Sydney is twenty-nine and has already been married twice, one marriage ended in divorce and the other in widowhood. Slowly, she is trying to put her life back together after the shocking and unexpected sudden death of her beloved Daniel.

During the summer of 2002 she takes on the job as tutor to Julie, the teenage daughter of Mr and Mrs Edwards. The family and Sydney are staying at their oceanfront cottage until September which is ideal as this enables Sydney to escape her former life in Boston...more Sydney is twenty-nine and has already been married twice, one marriage ended in divorce and the other in widowhood. Slowly, she is trying to put her life back together after the shocking and unexpected sudden death of her beloved Daniel.

During the summer of 2002 she takes on the job as tutor to Julie, the teenage daughter of Mr and Mrs Edwards. The family and Sydney are staying at their oceanfront cottage until September which is ideal as this enables Sydney to escape her former life in Boston in the hope that distance will help her work out what she wants to do with her future. From the start it is clear to Sydney that Julie is slow and no amount of tutoring will help her make progress. In spite of this the two become close and Sydney realises that Julie has a strong artistic bent and begins to encourage her talents.

Jeff and Ben are Mr and Mrs Edwards’ grown up sons. They meet Sydney for the first time during a weekend break at the cottage. Later in the summer they come back to join the family for a holiday in August. It is clear that Ben is fond of Sydney but it seems that Jeff has his eye on her too. So Sydney is drawn into the middle of a powerful web of old rivalries, tensions and family secrets.

This is a stunning piece of writing and I couldn’t put the book down. As only the second Anita Shreve book I have read it was no less intriguing or enjoyable than the first and it will not be the last. The style in which this story is written, its short, jagged paragraphs, is emotionally exhausting to read. The clever and witty use of language and brilliant insight into the human condition sets Anita Shreve’s work apart from most other authors writing in this genre. The descriptiveness of her words is mesmerising:

“….the sense of mission, the rhyming clacking of the rails, the fast receding lights in the distance….”

And this is just one line in the book but it describes a train journey so precisely.

"Sydney enters her room and is immediately overwhelmed by grief for Daniel..........She remembers their fit, her pale leg slipping between his two when they lay together after making love, as if their limbs had been deliberately fashioned for this purpose. The way Daniel would never cross a room without glancing at her face. The way he'd come home from his shift, drained, searching for her, room to room, only the sight of her allowing him access to normal life."

That sounds like love to me!

It is difficult to say more about this particular story without giving too much away so all I will say is, if you haven’t done so already, pick up this or any of Anita Shreve’s books. You will not be sorry.
(less)

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Mar 14, 2013 Paola (A Novel Idea) rated it 3 of 5 stars

Originally posted at A Novel Idea Reviews

Rating: 3.5/5

Sydney, in the wake of her second husband’s death, has signed on as the private tutor of a rich family’s only daughter. On the same New Hampshire shore and in the same beachside house that was central to the settings of three other books (Fortune’s Rocks, The Pilot’s Wife, Sea Glass), Sydney will experience renewal, heartbreak, and rediscovery. While she has her own emotional baggage after two marriages cut short by divorce and tragedy, the E...more Originally posted at A Novel Idea Reviews

Rating: 3.5/5

Sydney, in the wake of her second husband’s death, has signed on as the private tutor of a rich family’s only daughter. On the same New Hampshire shore and in the same beachside house that was central to the settings of three other books (Fortune’s Rocks, The Pilot’s Wife, Sea Glass), Sydney will experience renewal, heartbreak, and rediscovery. While she has her own emotional baggage after two marriages cut short by divorce and tragedy, the Edwards family has just as many bottled up secrets that continue to come in with the tide. As Sydney becomes closer to her young charge, the intellectually slow but artistically gifted teenager Julie, she also becomes caught up in a rivalry between Julie’s two brothers that runs deeper than family’s roots can go. Sydney’s story becomes the final chapter in the series, her voice joining those of other women who have lived within these walls and paced the same shore with troubled hearts or empty hands. Her story is about love, loss, and family, but also about regaining balance and becoming stronger as a person.

As I’ve reviewed the three books preceding this one in Anita Shreve’s series revolving around the same New Hampshire house, you’d think I would’ve read the last book much earlier than this. Just my luck, of course, that this was the only one our local library didn’t have. I had to wait for it to be re-ordered, since it had been lost, and it had been on my request list for almost a year before I finally got the surprising email saying it had arrived and was ready for me to pick it up. I think that, in comparison to the three that come before it, this one was the weakest of the quartet… however, it isn’t to say that the book didn’t satisfy me. I have talked about the series before, but to summarize, the first book (Fortune’s Rocks) is set with the house’s original Victorian owners whose daughter becomes involved in a forbidden love affair. The next book (Sea Glass) moves us to the 1930′s, when the house becomes the home of a newlywed couple who are confronted with both the challenges of their uncertain marriage and the uncertainty of the labor movement in America. The third book (The Pilot’s Wife), definitely the most well-known, explores the alternate life of one woman’s husband in the aftermath of his death and questions how much one person can ever really know about another. In essence, the series and each individual book explores a different woman every time, and yet their stories somewhat echo each other even throughout years and even as the setting changes. The same ocean pounds the same strand of beach, but the house and the women in it always change even as the themes remain fundamentally the same. That being said, Sydney was not as compelling as the others who preceded her, but I am still in love with the setting of these books and the stories that all return to this same house. And really, I think that the twist at the end of this book was pretty painful and complex. Wow, I blabbed forever about this one without really telling you anything, haha. I think what I will say is, go pick up all the books in the series, read them in order, and you will understand why I like them. Hahaha.

By the way, I actually ended up reading these 4 books backwards because I had NO idea they were part of a series. They aren’t labeled as such, they just all center around the same house over time. Tricky, Anita Shreve. Good thing I like you. Though, you know, reading them backwards is another way to go about it that was no less fulfilling.(less)

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May 08, 2012 Erin Rogers rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

Meh. Full discloser: I have never read a single other Anita Shreve book, and so I don't have the love for her as an author that so many other goodreaders seem to share. My first experience with her work was just okay. I saw the description "beach read" in another review, and I think that reflects my feelings towards Body Surfing. It's a half romance-half soap opera starring the WASP-y Edwards family and set in their New England beach house. Sydney, a once-divorced, once-widowed young woman, come...more

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Oct 07, 2011 Rebecca rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: chicklit

One of the things I like best about this author is how simple her stories are. Small cast, not much happens, but in a good way. Girl takes a lame job of tutoring a teenager and goes with the (rich) family to their house on the shore for summer. The two sons come up for a weekend and of course, promptly fall in love with Girl. The younger, more aggressive son comes with his girlfriend, whom he soon dumps and they get together. The story jumps ahead a year and they are about to get married when he...more

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Sep 15, 2011 Christie rated it 3 of 5 stars

I have been an Anita Shreve fan for several years – well, okay, decades. I read her first novel, Eden Close back in the 70s when it first came out and remember really liking it. Her novel The Pilot’s Wife was an Oprah pick and, thus, huge. But I’m partial to the quieter novels: Where or When, The Last Time They Met.

Body Surfing is the story of Sydney, a once-divorced, once-widowed woman who comes to live on the New Hampshire coast to tutor the beautiful but intellectually challenged Julie, young...more

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Jul 28, 2011 Dee rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: women, read-2011

more like one and a half...if it hadn't been a challenge book I probably would have DNF'd it...thankfully, it only cost me $4 on the hardback sale shelf at borders vice full prince...

I had many issues with it - the first being that there was wayyy to much about the authors political views showing through...I really hate it when I start to read a book and there is a section complaining about a certain section or person in the government...it seemed obvious that she also hadn't done a lot of resea...more

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Jun 07, 2011 Charlynn rated it 3 of 5 stars

Imagine being a twenty-nine year old woman, one divorced and then once widowed. It's not a very common occurrence, but it is the main character of this book - Sydney's reality. This is the stage of her life in which she finds herself when she goes to work for the Edwards family. Ostensibly to tutor their teenage daughter, Julie, so that she can pass and do well on her upcoming SAT's, Sydney goes to stay with the Edwards at their beach house in New Hampshire. There, she body surfs, meets the Edwa...more Imagine being a twenty-nine year old woman, one divorced and then once widowed. It's not a very common occurrence, but it is the main character of this book - Sydney's reality. This is the stage of her life in which she finds herself when she goes to work for the Edwards family. Ostensibly to tutor their teenage daughter, Julie, so that she can pass and do well on her upcoming SAT's, Sydney goes to stay with the Edwards at their beach house in New Hampshire. There, she body surfs, meets the Edwards' two sons Ben and Jeff, and begins to live again. As she opens Julie's eyes to her future, to love, Sydney once more opens her own heart and falls in love with Jeff. But then, on the night of her wedding, she learns an hideous truth, sending her life into yet another downward spiral.

The interesting thing about this book is, just as Sydney is lied to, so are we as readers. I was none the wiser towards the truth than she was, and, though, in the back of mind, I suspected that something might be wrong, I never thought it was what was eventually revealed. It was heartbreaking and devastating, though my pain, of course, was minor compared to what the character experienced.

At the same time, Julie runs away from home, the Edwards brothers get into a fight and never find their way out of it, Sydney forms a close relationship with her future father-in-law, and Mrs. Edwards never once thaws towards her employee/future daughter-in-law. While Sydney is undoubtedly the main character, as a whole, this book is a family drama, exploring all the various relationships one finds present in a nuclear family, making it extremely relatable. Also, due to the fact that it is written in the present tense, there is a sense of 'now' to the story, of the audience, as readers, being present. Though somewhat unconventional, it makes the story stand out.

My only complaint about Body Surfing has to deal with the ending. The characters were extremely compelling - all rich and real, and the plot was character driven, my favorite. However, with this praise being said, the ending was abrupt. Though poignant and a fitting close, I also felt as though the story was left unfinished, but perhaps that was the point. Because this book was more of a character study, maybe it was just a brief glimpse into these people's lives and, once it was over, we were to realize that they would continue... even if the novel didn't. Whether this was the case or not, though, I wouldn't have complained if the author - Anita Shreve - would have offered her readers just a little bit more to wrap the tale up.

Read more: http://miss-sbooks.livejournal.com/(less)

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Mar 07, 2011 Sarah rated it 2 of 5 stars

Body Surfing is the fourth book in what is known as the "Fortune's Rocks" quartet by Anita Shreve; however it serves perfectly fine as a stand-alone novel.

Although Sydney is only twenty-nine years old, she has been both divorced and widowed. When she vacations with a prominent family at their beach-house in New Hampshire to tutor their daughter with slow learning problems named Julie, Sydney finds herself as the love interest torn between two brothers. Body Surfingis the tale of the classic lov...more

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Dec 07, 2010 Kirsty Darbyshire rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: paperback

A fab book, deeper than some of Shreve's recent work. She's back in the same house on the New England coast that has featured in several of her other novels. This is good if you've read them. If you haven't the exposition about the house's history is probably a bit incestuous and certainly extraneous to the story here.

Sydney Sklar, only about 28 years old or so I think, has already weathered two marriages: divorcing an aviator who was likely to kill himself and being widowed by a doctor who, wel

...more

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Sep 12, 2010 Amainer rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I haven't read any Anita Shreve in a while. The first book of hers that I read was Sea Glass which I really enjoyed. I also enjoyed The Weight of Water and Fortune's Rocks but the rest have been somewhat of a disappointment. So I quit reading her books. I saw this book several times in the store, but never picked it up b/c books like Resistance and All He Ever Wanted were so disappointing. Then I saw this in our used bookstore and decided to give it a try. I'm so glad I did.

This book re...more

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Jun 10, 2009 Karen rated it 3 of 5 stars

My library had a display that said "Beach Reads" and I thought, that's what I need after all those bible books I've been reading! So I picked this one, mostly because I'd read "Light on Snow" by the author awhile back. I have to say I was disappointed in the book, but I'm not sure if it's the book's fault or false advertising by the library. I don't know that I'd classify it as a "Beach Read". It DID take place on a beach! But I found it pretty depressing. And the author's way of writing it kind...more

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May 09, 2009 Janet rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I would give this 3&1/2 stars if able. Shreve creates great, very real, often flawed, and sometimes unlikable characters. Once again the beach house in New Hampshire provides the perfect setting - this house has been central to 3 or 4 of her books, all set in different times so that we learn a little more of its history each time - the story of the beach house has become almost as compelling as the main stories. The character of Sydney comes to the house & the Edwards family as a paid su...more

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Jun 07, 2011 Lynley rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: american, women-s

I didn't warm to the main character, partly because I couldn't understand why she didn't work things out earlier - because I did. Stupidity never endears me to a character. Perhaps Sydney's attention was distracted by her manic vigilance - she notices clothes, how someone breathes, the details of a room and she even deduces what other characters are probably thinking. Whether she is right - another matter entirely. I'm inclined to think a character as naive as this one makes for a fairly unrelia...more I didn't warm to the main character, partly because I couldn't understand why she didn't work things out earlier - because I did. Stupidity never endears me to a character. Perhaps Sydney's attention was distracted by her manic vigilance - she notices clothes, how someone breathes, the details of a room and she even deduces what other characters are probably thinking. Whether she is right - another matter entirely. I'm inclined to think a character as naive as this one makes for a fairly unreliable narrator. Perhaps it would have been a more satisfying choice had Shreve decided to write from a more omniscient point of view. Instead, everything is filtered through Sydney's interpretation. Characters who obsess over what others are wearing come across as shallow to me, and led me to wonder if other people actually notice such details more readily than I do. (I think some do, some don't.)

I listened to the audio book, which means I wasn't bothered by the short paragraphs others have mentioned, but it still felt choppy and I wondered at times if I had skipped a chapter, or zoned out, as can happen so easily with an audio book. But I don't think this was the case.

The narrator did that really annoying thing whereby she changed her voice to emulate character voices, but for me it NEVER works when a woman attempts a male voice, or when a male attempts a female voice. I wish this wouldn't happen in audio books - instead, if voices are going to change, I prefer radio plays, which make use of completely different people. I'm not sure if this is a personal preference or if it's shared by many. But the narrator's voicing of Ben and Jeff resulted in a low, guttural, unnatural sound used by men who think they're hot stuff, and this didn't endear me to the men either. The characters of the mother and Victoria were voiced in a 'posh' voice, which I thought was overdoing it, because the listener can tell the characters of these women simply by what they do.

I did really enjoy The Pilot's Wife some time ago, but I didn't enjoy this story nearly so much.(less)

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Feb 16, 2013 Brandee rated it 2 of 5 stars

Why do I keep reading Anita Shreve books? I guess I am chasing after that feeling I had when I read my first one, "The Weight of Water", or even "Sea Glass". Those two were pretty good, but all the others have just been disappointing. They are light, easy, but mostly just silly and underdeveloped. This book, especially, really seemed to have no point and so much of it was just not believable at all. And, just wondering, am I the only one who found the format of this book strange and slightly ann...more

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Jun 13, 2012 Linda G rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: yes

Recommended to Linda G by: self

Shelves: fiction, family-drama

*********************** Spoiler**********************************************

This book has an ending that I felt I got hit by a bus. I didn't anticipate the ending at all. Sydney is tutoring a beautiful 18 year old who is handicapped. Sydney sees that she is willing to study and do everthing Sydney suggests but she will never be accepted at the Ivy League colleges her mother is planning for her future. She is the youngest child out of three and the only girl. Her mother, Mrs Edwards had her at a...more

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Jul 29, 2010 Christine rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: decent-fiction

This is Shreve's fourth story about the same New England beach house. This is the story of Sydney, a once-widowed, once-divorced, young woman who lives with a family during a summer to tutor their daughter.

Sydney becomes part of the family - older sister to the girl she's tutoring, friend to the father, and an object of interest and competition for the two brothers. The tale that unfolds is sad - difficult to watch people undo themselves, yet still surprising because the exact way they behave s...more

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Jun 04, 2010 Julie Britt rated it 1 of 5 stars

Spoiler alert: I didn't like this book. I didn't care about the characters, which weren't well developed, and the main character keeps making the same mistakes again and again and doesn't seem all that smart. I had to force myself to finish it. The final section seemed to have promise because I expected to see the main character in a good light, but she just went back to where she started.

The passive voice is not avoided by Anita Shreve. I kept getting irritated at that, as well as her continuo...more

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Dec 13, 2012 Debbie rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is one I wish that there was an option for a half star. I’d give this book 3 ½ stars. This will be a brief review. This was an ok book. Anita Shreve is a talented descriptive writer. She paints a good picture of the atmosphere, the setting and the details of her characters. This is a kind of love story. A kind of story about family. I don't want to give much detail away because that's all there is. To be honest this review is hard for me because though the writing was good and once the stor...more

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Jan 22, 2011 Trisha rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: drama, literary-fiction, reviewed, romance, womens-fiction

I guess this could go on the "romance" shelf as well, but that isn't so much the point of the story, as family is.

One thing I noticed about this novel was that...there was not one typo. At least as far as I know (like, there could have been a typo in some American town name I don't know the proper spelling of or something. hehe). I've been reading epic fantasy novels lately by the same author/s, and they're RIDDLED with typos! So it was a nice change to read a book that was perfect.

Anita Shreve'...more

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Aug 01, 2009 Kolleen rated it 3 of 5 stars

...more

***SPOILERS*** Anita Shreve is one of those authors who I just always have to read her books. Some of them are so powerfully written, like The Pilot's Wife and The Weight of Water, and some of them are just okay, quick reads to pass the time. This happened to be one of those books. The writing was broken up into small, sporadic paragraphs which made for a very quick read, and I found the first part of the book to be very well developed. I loved the relationship between Sydney and Julie, and Sydney's past was just heartbreaking, especially the death of her husband Daniel. One of the best quotes of the book was when Sydney described her loss: "She remembers their particular fit, her pale leg slipping between his two when they lay together after making love, as if their limbs had been deliberately fashioned for this purpose. The way Daniel would never cross a room without glancing at her face. The way he'd come home from his shift, drained, searching for her, room to room, only the sight of her allowing him access to a normal life." It just captivates the true sense of the love that she had that is now lost.

However, when the brothers come home and compete for her attention, the story just turns dramatic. Entertaining, but a little over-done and far-fetched. Jeff and Ben, two brothers, fight over Sydney from when they first lay eyes on her. Sydney and Jeff end up having a relationship and engagement 11 months into the relationship (after having already been married twice, you think she wouldn't rush into it), only to have Jeff leave her at the alter because he never really loved her in the first place, it was just all a game to spite his brother.

In the end, I ended up with more questions than answers. What was the signifigance of Julie ending up a lesbian? What was the original problem between the brothers to make Jeff go to that extent to hurt both Ben and Sydney? And why did Jeff's mom hate Sydney so much, and then apologize at the end? All in all, it was a good book with all of Shreve's trademark plots: love triangles, affairs, jealousy, and betrayel. It's just disappointing to see an author with such potential that can produce such moving and powerful stories to just compose a mediocre novel.

(less)

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Oct 31, 2012 Linda rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: audio

I have recently read two other Anita Shreve books, A Change in Altitude and Light on Snow and I enjoyed them both. However, this book did not live up to my expectations. The narration was excellent and the story line somewhat plausible but I didn’t connect with the main characters in a significant way.

The story revolved around Sydney, a young woman who was going through a period of self-reflection, rebuilding and perhaps even a little escape. She had lost two husbands, one by death and one by d...more

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Aug 26, 2011 Rita rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

É uma história super agradável e, por isso, dá sempre vontade de ler um pouquinho mais. Conta a história de uma mulher, primeiro divorciada e depois viúva, que está "encarregue" de preparar uma rapariga atrasada (é mesmo este nome que lhe dão) para entrar na faculdade no final daquele Verão. Sidney, não sabe que depois de tamanhas desilusões amorosas o amor ainda lhe tem reservado mais surpresas. E aí é que nós somos testemunhas de todos os acontecimentos.
Não é uma história com relevos particula...more

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Aug 04, 2010 Lindsey rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: post-university-reads

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Jun 21, 2010 Clarissa rated it 4 of 5 stars

Anita Shreve was one of the fortunate living writers (pre James Frey) to have her book picked by Oprah to be in the Oprah book club. Although not an avid book club member, I have from time to time, picked up an Oprah book club book. A few years ago I read The Pilot's Wife. Shreve has a way of writing that is different and fresh. Her voice is detached and strangely unemotional considering her choice of plots. The Pilot's wife is about a woman who experiences crushing grief after her husband unexp...more

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About Anita Shreve

Anita Shreve grew up in Dedham, Massachusetts (just outside Boston), the eldest of three daughters. Early literary influences include having read Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton when she was a junior in high school (a short novel she still claims as one of her favorites) and everything Eugene O'Neill ever wrote while she was a senior (to which she attributes a somewhat dark streak in her own work). A...more Anita Shreve grew up in Dedham, Massachusetts (just outside Boston), the eldest of three daughters. Early literary influences include having read Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton when she was a junior in high school (a short novel she still claims as one of her favorites) and everything Eugene O'Neill ever wrote while she was a senior (to which she attributes a somewhat dark streak in her own work). After graduating from Tufts University, she taught high school for a number of years in and around Boston. In the middle of her last year, she quit (something that, as a parent, she finds appalling now) to start writing. "I had this panicky sensation that it was now or never."

Joking that she could wallpaper her bathroom with rejections from magazines for her short stories ("I really could have," she says), she published her early work in literary journals. One of these stories, "Past the Island, Drifting," won an O. Henry prize. Despite this accolade, she quickly learned that one couldn't make a living writing short fiction. Switching to journalism, Shreve traveled to Nairobi, Kenya, where she lived for three years, working as a journalist for an African magazine. One of her novels, The Last Time They Met, contains bits and pieces from her time in Africa.

Returning to the United States, Shreve was a writer and editor for a number of magazines in New York. Later, when she began her family, she turned to freelancing, publishing in the New York Times Magazine, New York magazine and dozens of others. In 1989, she published her first novel, Eden Close. Since then she has written 12 other novels, among them The Weight of Water, The Pilot's Wife, The Last Time They Met, A Wedding in December, and Body Surfing.

In 1998, Shreve received the PEN/L. L. Winship Award and the New England Book Award for fiction. In 1999, she received a phone call from Oprah Winfrey, and The Pilot's Wife became the 25th selection of Oprah's Book Club and an international bestseller. In April 2002, CBS aired the film version of The Pilot's Wife, starring Christine Lahti, and in fall 2002, The Weight of Water, starring Elizabeth Hurley and Sean Penn, was released in movie theaters.

Still in love with the novel form, Shreve writes only in that genre. "The best analogy I can give to describe writing for me is daydreaming," she says. "A certain amount of craft is brought to bear, but the experience feels very dreamlike."

Shreve is married to a man she met when she was 13. She has two children and three stepchildren, and in the last eight years has made tuition payments to seven colleges and universities.(less)

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“Sydney discovers that she minds the loss of her mourning. When she grieved, she felt herself to be intimately connected to Daniel. But with each passing day, he floats away from her. When she thinks about him now, it is more as a lost possibility than as a man. She has forgotten his breath, his musculature.” — 10 people liked it

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