Flying Soloby Linda Holmes
Rating: ★★★½
isbn: 9781399707787
Publication Date: June 28, 2022
Pages: 304
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Hachette Books
Smarting from her recently cancelled wedding and about to turn forty, Laurie Sassalyn returns to her Maine hometown of Calcasset to handle the estate of her great-aunt Dot, a spirited adventurer who lived to be ninety-three.
Alongside boxes of Polaroids and pottery, a mysterious wooden duck shows up at the bottom of a cedar chest. Laurie's curiosity is piqued, especially after she finds a love letter to the never-married Dot that ends with the line "And anyway, if you're ever desperate, there are always ducks, darling."
When the mysterious duck disappears under suspicious circumstances, Laurie feels compelled to figure out why anyone would steal something worth so little -and why Dot kept it hidden away in the first place.
Suddenly Laurie finds herself swept up in a righteous caper that has her negotiating with antiques dealers and con artists, going on after-hours dates at the local library, and reconnecting with her oldest friend and her first love .
Desperate to uncover her great-aunt's secrets, Laurie must reckon with her own past and her future-and ultimately embrace her own vision of flying solo.
This is one of those books that I enjoyed, but should have loved. It has all sorts of elements that resonate with me, and it was well written to boot. If I were to use a fishing metaphor (and I am), I’d say the hook caught, but failed to set, leaving me with an enjoyable ride that I was able to shake off when finished, without lasting effects.
The MC is a 40 year old who has always known she doesn’t want kids of her own, and after a cancelled engagement, is coming to realise she doesn’t want to get married either; she cherishes having her own space and not having to share it with anybody else. But coming back to her hometown reunites her with her high-school boyfriend as they and her BFF try to figure out the mystery behind the wooden duck.
I like what the author was trying to do here, with the romantic dynamic, but I’m not sure … I think she might have written herself into a corner, and her attempt to extricate herself from that corner left the ending unsatisfying. It’s probably the most realistic ending in Real Life, but in fiction it left me wishing for a better resolution. The plot about the duck was fun, and I enjoyed how they did the research and followed the clues, though as a long time mystery reader, some of it felt a tad clumsy. Nothing that made me cringe, but these characters weren’t investigators, so their awkwardness was probably quite realistic.
All in all, it was a great library read; I enjoyed the story, but I’m not going to wish I owned a copy of my own. I’m glad I read it, but I’ll be happy to return it too.