Lady Sunshine by Amy Mason Doan

Disclosure: I received a free copy of this book to facilitate this review. All opinions are my own.

Purchase from Amazon

Outside of all things Disney reading brings me the greatest joy. I love going on adventures, getting lost in another world, or traveling around the world. Reading takes me places I can only dream of in reality. 

Book Description

ONE ICONIC FAMILY. ONE SUMMER OF SECRETS. THE DAZZLING SPIRIT OF 1970S CALIFORNIA.

For Jackie Pierce, everything changed the summer of 1979, when she spent three months of infinite freedom at her bohemian uncle’s sprawling estate on the California coast. As musicians, artists, and free spirits gathered at The Sandcastle for the season in pursuit of inspiration and communal living, Jackie and her cousin Willa fell into a fast friendship, testing their limits along the rocky beach and in the wild woods... until the summer abruptly ended in tragedy, and Willa silently slipped away into the night.

Twenty years later, Jackie unexpectedly inherits The Sandcastle and returns to the iconic estate for a short visit to ready it for sale. But she reluctantly extends her stay when she learns that, before her death, her estranged aunt had promised an up-and-coming producer he could record a tribute album to her late uncle at the property’s studio. As her musical guests bring the place to life again with their sun-drenched beach days and late-night bonfires, Jackie begins to notice startling parallels to that summer long ago. And when a piece of the past resurfaces and sparks new questions about Willa’s disappearance, Jackie must discover if the dark secret she’s kept ever since is even the truth at all.

About Amy Mason Doan

"Doan's characters leap off the page," says Publishers Weekly. Amy's novels are warmly told, nostalgic stories of relatable women confronting their pasts. SUMMER HOURS, set in coastal California and Oregon, is both a gripping, sensual coming-of-age story and a love story to Pacific Coast Highway. It has been called "Hot and heavy," (Cosmopolitan), "Unforgettable," (BookPage), and "A perfect summer read" (Booklist). 

THE SUMMER LIST draws on Amy's beloved summers in lakeside Pinecrest, California. “With a vivid sense of place and characters as real as your high school besties, this debut novel is sure to please fans of Kristin Hannah and Elin Hilderbrand," says Library Journal. 

Amy lives in Portland, Oregon with her husband, daughter, and rescue tabby. She grew up in California, but as a girl, she visited the Oregon Shakespeare Fest with her grandparents every year, so she now considers both states home.

 As a writer for publications including The Oregonian, San Francisco Chronicle, Wired, and Forbes, Amy has interviewed everyone from beer-brewing monks to nanotechnologists. Amy has an M.A. in Journalism from Stanford University and a B.A. in English from U.C. Berkeley.

My thoughts 

I was swept up into this book of vivid colors. The author brought to life a world of music, art, and summer of magic.

A story of family, friendship, secrets, and forgiveness the author took me on an emotional ride through two decades of time.

When Jackie goes to spend a summer with her uncle she and her cousin Willa become fast friends. The summer is one that brings joy, family, and secrets colliding together.

Years later Jackie returns to the place she spent one magical summer that ended in tragedy. Through honoring the last request from her aunt Jackie begins to uncover the at and sees that magical summer as more than it was.

The author truly had me turning the pages to find to what happened. She breathed life into these characters and with a stroke of a pen brought to life so many colors and vivid imagery. Truly a spellbinding book to read.