The Second Coming of Lucy Hatch: A Novel

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The Second Coming of Lucy Hatch: A Novel

3.77 of 5 stars 3.77 · rating details · 496 ratings · 94 reviews

"A fresh talent weaves an engaging tale of love, life, and second chances in this stirring first novel set in a small Southern town" For fans of Billie Letts, Adriana Trigiani, and Lorna Landvik comes this uniquely heartfelt and spirited story from a sparkling new voice. Farm wife Lucy Hatch never dreamed her husband would walk out into the field one morning and never come...more

Hardcover, 304 pages

Published August 6th 2002 by William Morrow & Company (first published 2002)

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Apr 23, 2013 Miranda Davis rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Miranda by: Jill

Shelves: keeper, wonderful

How in the hell do I go about describing this story and my reaction to it?

I'm going to have to resort to analogies. Bear with me, I'm still stunned stupid.

If Scout (To Kill a Mockingbird) had married right out of high school and out of a conviction that it would be her one shot, she would narrate the story of her rebirth in widowhood with as much wry grace as Lucy Hatch, the narrator and female lead in this wonderful, romantic novel. (And if you dislike first-person narrative romances, this is i...more How in the hell do I go about describing this story and my reaction to it?

I'm going to have to resort to analogies. Bear with me, I'm still stunned stupid.

If Scout (To Kill a Mockingbird) had married right out of high school and out of a conviction that it would be her one shot, she would narrate the story of her rebirth in widowhood with as much wry grace as Lucy Hatch, the narrator and female lead in this wonderful, romantic novel. (And if you dislike first-person narrative romances, this is in a different class entirely.)

If memoirist Mary Karr (Liar's Poker) had tried to come to terms with a dead husband she shouldn't have married in the first place no matter how steady, honorable and earnest he'd been, she might possibly have sounded as guilty, truthful, skeptical, and very funny and confused as Lucy Hatch does, while picking up the pieces after her husband's untimely death on their East Texas farm.

That's just for starters. The author has a glorious command of language: lyrical descriptive passages capture the beauty of the spare landscape, the vicissitudes of weather and emotions, and the worn house Lucy Hatch makes home to begin to define her life as a widow at 33; each character contributes a distinct, often funny, voice that rings true to the story, to families, to small towns and to Texas; and she enables her narrator, Lucy, to acknowledge with delicacy and impact in turn the numbness of loss, the thrilling terror of attraction and its uncertainties, the ambivalence of dependence on another; and finally, Ms. Moyer did it all with such authenticity, it felt like a life being lived, all of it unfolding, as in life and as it must, inconveniently.

Then there's the guy who stares at her from his beat-up, white pick-up truck soon after she returns to her hometown. Ash Farrell. He works with his hands. He's drop-your-panties gorgeous and a survivor of less-than-auspicious beginnings himself. And he can sing, damn it. His single-minded pursuit of Lucy and infinite patience would have irked me as annoyingly unrealistic, if not for all the realities of Lucy's situation that weighed on me for her sake. He waited because she was worth the waiting. He persisted because she'd lost her footing in life, and he knows a bit about this himself. And he loved her before he made love to her, knowing she wasn't certain she deserved to find joy in the arms of another man so soon. But he was willing to ride through the storms to find out what she's decided.

One final analogy, sorry. Lucy says the smell of Ash Farrell's neck was instantly familiar, unforgettable and somehow perfectly right. So was this story.

I loved it and I hope you find a copy to read for yourself.
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Miranda Davis Fantasy, possibly, I enjoyed a shape-shifter romance; paranormal, not sure what it entails, R/S wah? Western? The kind you recommend, yes. Would I tra...more
updated May 05, 2013 09:34am

Jill Well I appreciate your confidence in my choice of books, Miranda but sooner or later you'll come to one you'll wonder why on earth I would think it's...more
Apr 24, 2013 04:23pm

Feb 08, 2010 Liisa rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Liisa by: Marleen

Shelves: borrowed-from-a-friend, trilogies-and-series

'The Second Coming of Lucy Hatch' by Marsha Moyer isn't your typical girl meets boy story. It's more ... girl meets (boring) boy, girl and (boring) boy marry, girl becomes an amoeba, boy dies and then the real story starts. Re-discovery. Home-coming. Forbidden love.

Although it could be characterised as a romance, 'The Second Coming of Lucy Hatch' has more bite and backbone than some of the fluff you can find on a bookshelf. The characters are multi-faceted, easy to love and relate to; and the ra...more

3 likes · like · see review

Apr 30, 2011 Jessica Sinn (Chick Lit Cafe) rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

After her husband’s horrific death by tractor, Lucy Hatch returns to her sleepy little hometown in the piney woods of East Texas. For 14 years, she lived the simple life as a farmer’s wife, spending her days gazing out the window at her silent, passionless husband as he plows the fields.

Thrust into widowhood at the tender age of 33, she tries to rebuild a life of peace and solitude. With some help from her wise old aunt Dove and her protective brother Bailey, she gets herself a job at the loca...more

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Feb 23, 2011 Jill rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: contemporary-romance, 4-5-5-stars

When Lucy Hatch's husband dies in a horrific accident, she leaves their farm and heads back to her hometown and family in Texas. Although she had been somewhat content in her marriage, Lucy has no spark in her life after 14 years. Ash Farrell is the town bad boy - with a heart of gold - who has turned his life around. Now Ash is not really as bad as his reputation and soon he has his sights set on Lucy, determined to bring out the real Lucy Hatch who has been stifled and hidden for so long.

This...more

4 likes · like · see review

Dec 20, 2011 Heidi rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I love this book, not because it is a marvel of literary genius (it isn't -- it's good but not marvelous), but because more than any other book I've ever read, the characters speak to me almost as well as if I had written them myself. Lucy and Ash and the inhabitants of Mooney, Texas are appealing and human and flawed in a way that is entirely on my own wavelength. I've never been to East Texas, but these folks feel like people I have always known.

This is the first in a series of (so far) four...more

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Mar 09, 2011 Emery Lee rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

While I'm not a big reader of contemporary fiction or first person narratives, Marsha Moyer has made a believer of me with THE SECOND COMING OF LUCY HATCH.

Lucy is sympathetic and believable as she struggles with the grief and guilt of finding new love after the loss of her husband.

I really like the honky tonk signing hero, Ash, although he seems ALMOST too good to be true in suddenly changing his philandering ways after setting his sights on Lucy. But I guess that's what makes for a great romanc...more

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Aug 21, 2007 Tami rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: those who love beautiful prose

This book ranks at the top of my all-time favorites because of the writing style. It's a good story - very touching - but it's the stlye that really got to me. Ms. Moyer paints beautiful, memorable word pictures. Unfortunately the next two books in the series don't measurae up.

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Feb 12, 2012 Teresa Medeiros rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I have to start this blog by admitting that I'm an idiot. At least 3 years ago, lovely and wise Avon author Christie Ridgway gave me a glowing recommendation for a trade paperback called THE SECOND COMING OF LUCY HATCH by Marsha Moyer. Christie glowed SO brightly about this book that I wisely went out and bought not only LUCY HATCH but it's companion novel THE LAST OF THE HONKY TONK ANGELS. So why am I an idiot, you ask? Because I let the book languish on my bookshelf for 3 years before finally...more I have to start this blog by admitting that I'm an idiot. At least 3 years ago, lovely and wise Avon author Christie Ridgway gave me a glowing recommendation for a trade paperback called THE SECOND COMING OF LUCY HATCH by Marsha Moyer. Christie glowed SO brightly about this book that I wisely went out and bought not only LUCY HATCH but it's companion novel THE LAST OF THE HONKY TONK ANGELS. So why am I an idiot, you ask? Because I let the book languish on my bookshelf for 3 years before finally picking it up to take on a long plane trip last week.

Lucy Hatch's second coming begins with the first line of the novel: I was thirty-three years old when my husband walked out into the field one morning and never came back and I went in one quick leap from wife to widow. At 19, Lucy had wed a taciturn, stoic 27-year-old farmer, believing that still waters run deep only to discover that sometimes still waters only run...well...still. For fourteen years, they were the kind of couple who had an abiding respect for each other but who rarely spoke and only made love with the lights off. Lucy sincerely grieves Mitchell when he dies but perhaps her greatest grief comes from admitting to herself that she also feels a tiny smidgen of relief.

Texas is in the very bones of this book and the grieving Lucy retreats to her hometown of Mooney, Texas to try to find the girl she lost all those years ago. As Lucy sets out to rediscover herself in a little ramshackle rental house out in the country, her family rallies around her: Aunt Dove, her "spinster aunt" and the wisest of the lot, her good looking brother Bailey, her slightly plus-sized and plus-hearted sister-in-law Geneva.

It's Bailey and Geneva who drag Lucy out of that rental house and back to her favorite teenage haunt--the local honky tonk, the Round-Up. That's where she comes face-to-face with town bad boy Ash Farrell. Ah, Ash Farrell! (Insert swooning sigh here). Although he's not a cowboy, Ash is a "cowboy hero" in the best sense of the tradition. He's a lean, tall drink of water--a carpenter (who knows how to use his hands!) by day and a singer who performs every Friday night down at the Round-Up. Women line up at the bar to vie for his attentions after each performance but the minute he sees Lucy, he "sets his sights on her." He brings her flowers, he brings her a puppy, he fixes her leaky pipes. (And no--that's not a metaphor!) His courtship and her initial resistance set every tongue in Mooney wagging.

Marsha Moyer is a master at both dialogue and characterization. I think I first fell in love with Ash when he was telling Lucy about the steeple at the local Baptist Church:

"Reverend Honeywell's got a couple of spotlights trained on it at night now," Ash said. "In case, I guess, Jesus decides to come back at two in the morning and can't see to land."

When we learn that Ash went into foster care at the age of four when they found him all alone in the house with his mentally ill mother, "sitting in the closet eating dog biscuits right out of the box," I'm ready to hand him both my house keys and my panties.

You often hear romance readers whining about how hard it is to create unique love scenes after they've written several books. Their hero and heroine have done it in the rocking chair. They've swung from the chandelier. There can't possibly be any new words left to describe how to put Tab A into Slot B, can there? After reading this book, I'm happy to discover that there are. The love scenes in this book are infused with emotion and helped to remind me that it's not the mechanics that need refreshing but the language used to describe them:
So I let myself slide under again, my mind floating somewhere between dark and light, aware of nothing but my skin under his thickened fingertips, the silken grit of his unshaved chin as it grazed behind my ears, the curve of my throat, the hollow of my collarbone. The quilt had fallen to the floor, and my nightgown worked itself into a tangle at my hips as I felt him move down over me, kissing and kissing, creating a smooth, undulating purl of response from my head to my toes.

As irresistible as Ash is, it's Lucy's voice--wry, funny, and unflinchingly honest--that truly propels the story. When her brother Bailey tells her, "I just want you to be safe is all," Lucy replies with, "My husband got chewed up by a farm machine. Safe is a word that's gone straight out of my vocabulary."

THE SECOND COMING OF LUCY HATCH is both a beautifully written novel and a fine romance. There are very few books that capture the true joy and terror of falling in love and this is one of the best I've ever read. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to pull Marsha Moyer's second book, THE LAST OF THE HONKY TONK ANGELS, straight off my shelf before my IQ drops even lower.(less)

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Feb 22, 2010 Julie rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction-generic

This book started a little slow for me but really picked up steam. The start of the book finds the main character suddenly widowed and whisked back to her hometown by her family. Her life with her husband had been comfortable but not at all passionate and she was maybe content but not really happy. Suddenly she finds herself the interest of the most desired man in town.
There's a rollercoaster of emotions here, as the main chaaracter deals with disbelief and guilt and unfamiliar passion, as well...more

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Oct 18, 2009 Marleen rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites

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

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Jan 16, 2008 Jimmyjane rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, cupcake

I love Lucy. And I am knee-deep in love with Ash Farrell. For six bucks- bought at a bargain store on the basis of cover and title alone- I found my go-to book, my ultimate security blanket of a book, and one of my all-time favorites. Not at all bad for six bucks. I have read it a dozen times and the story and characters never fail me, with their love, humor and realness. It's the book that I take with me whenever I travel- that little piece of happiness that I can tuck into my bag or under my a...more

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Aug 25, 2012 Victoria Vane rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

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Jun 03, 2012 Mendy rated it 4 of 5 stars

I bought this book for two main reasons, 1 it was .50 and the other reason it was set in a small town in Texas. I love a bargain and I live in a small town in Texas so I thought win-win. I guess I got my money's worth since it took me a day to read. Unlike most books set in Texas this was not cheesy with silly Texas Characters. The characters were real with real emotions. So glad I found a new author to read. I will be reading the remainder of the books in this series.

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Jul 26, 2010 Jeanne rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: chick-lit

I really enjoyed this love story. Although, something happened towards the end of the book, kind of lost it's power and smoothness and actually got a bit boring, but overall a good read and I am interested enough to continue to read about Lucy Hatch. This author did make me smile and laugh outloud at times and over all I liked it and I will continue to read her novels. I hope she gets better with her writing as she continues her Lucy Hatch stories.

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Apr 19, 2012 Molly rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I was very pleasantly surprised by this book. It was in my price range (free) so I had to give it a try. I expected yet another romance novel about a midlife crisis resulting in romance and renewal of self, etc, etc. Although this book technically could be classified as a romance, it is an insult to place it in that genre. Very believable and vivid characters really made this book enjoyable to me.

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Dec 05, 2011 AnneOK rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011-reads

To be quite honest, I had no idea what to expect when I picked this book up to read. From the blurb on the back of the book, it sounded like something I might enjoy and came with the promise of romance. It was that and so much more. I loved the characters, both lead and secondary. It was a joy watching Lucy's "second coming." Ash was such a wonderful hero and a heartthrob too! Told in first person which isn't very often my favorite, this author wrote a beautiful and heart stealing story with suc...more

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Dec 19, 2012 Corene rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012-fiction

Somehow I'd never heard of this 2002 novel or the any of the follow up books in the series. So glad I stumbled on it! You could probably simplistically call it a romance, but it's too deep of a character study to label it a genre read. A very poignant story of a young widow's grief and her unexpected and immediate attraction to a sexy stranger. Lots of comedic moments in the dialogue and wry descriptions of Texas small town living.

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Jul 28, 2009 Cindy a/k/a LuLu Brown rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: library-borrowed, m-authors

I would really like to give this book 3 1/2 stars. It was a book I could put down and not a page turner.

Lucy Hatch is a lost soul looking to find her inner self. Her struggle to find her peace with God, her mother and her late husband is a roller coaster ride. I enjoyed her journey and the interesting characters she met along the way.

This is the first in a series of 4 books...I will try and read the others too. I don't want to miss what happens next...I read the blurbs!

TNBBC 2009 Summer Challen...more

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Aug 15, 2009 Nadiah rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, 2009

I can't say this is one of my favorite books. There are parts that I like, yet there are also some others that I am not comfortable with. While reading those parts, I wondered why the writer felt that she had to add those parts? But, then, at the end, I started to understand why. And, those parts were needed to help readers understand more about the main character, Lucy Hatch.

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Aug 09, 2011 Vicki Mollenauer added it

I read the second novel by Marsha Moyer first and became so involved in the lives of the characters that I just had to go back and read this novel. And, it was just as good. Whether reading this one first or not, I recommend that you read them both. They're fun and inspiring.

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Feb 27, 2010 Amy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I love this book; its realistic, simple and each time i read it i can find something that is relevant or new to my memory.A must read for anyone who feels they might be stuck in a bit of a rut and needs some inspiration to strike out on their own, even in small ways.

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Sep 15, 2009 Melissa rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: chick-lit

This was a great book of a woman who lost everything and her way back through finding herself, living alone, and finding love again. It was cute...nothing out of the ordinary but I still enjoyed it and there are more in this series so I'm going to try them out.

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Jul 03, 2011 Tammy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: already-own, novel

This was a simple love story - no major drama, no twists. I'm not normally into love stories, but just coming off the outrageousness of the Sookie Stackhouse books, this one seemed realistic and not too cheesy. I loved it.

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Nov 18, 2011 Amy rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Amy by: Neighborhood Bookclub

Shelves: book-club, chicklit

This is a tough review for me. For a chicklit book, I give it 3.5 stars. There is a lot to like here ;-). But I would also say I didn't like it because of the way the Lord's name was used throughout the book. For one thing, it's not right - and for another, I like to keep God out of guilty pleasure stories. It only serves as a reminder that I shouldn't be reading this!

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Feb 22, 2011 RUSA CODES rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: reading-list-2011

This is a Read-Alike title for Solomon’s Oak, the Reading List winner in the Women’s Fiction category for 2011. For the complete list, go to http://ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/rusa/aw...

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Nov 05, 2010 Rebecca rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

oh my gosh, when Ash drives all night through the storm to get to Lucy's house....I need to take a cold shower!
This was a really good "guilty pleasure" book for me. I've read the first two, liked #1 better.

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Aug 27, 2008 Sheila rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I enjoyed the story but felt a little uneasy with the way Lucy spoke about her husband (it really upset me the way she didn't have anything good to say about him for most of the book and how she seemed to care more about Ash after two weeks than she had about Mitchell in 14 years.). I'm a bit sensitive to that I guess. I loved the character of Ash and can't wait to see where the author takes him in the next book. I also enjoyed the small town feel of it...warm and familiar like the sweet smell o...more

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Mar 15, 2009 Jeanne rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

Would have been better if it had ended fifty pages earlier. I hate books that go on and on about a problem and resolve it and bam the problem is there again and on and on it goes.

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Feb 02, 2009 Aleycat54 rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is the first of either a 3 or 4 book set. I thoroughly enjoyed the first one, and was delighted to find out there were follow on's. The entire series is really good reading.

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Jul 15, 2012 Jennifer rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This was another great page turner recommended by my friend Sarah! I really enjoyed seeing Lucy come into her own. The relationship between her and Ash was electrifying! Great read!

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About Marsha Moyer

Marsha Moyer was born in Austin and grew up in Bryan/College Station in central Texas. After graduating from Bryan High School, she attended the University of Texas at Austin, and for the next 25 years held a variety of jobs, including those of secretary to two animal scientists in the field of swine management, newsletter editor at the Texas A&M computing center, and assistant to the late che...more

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