Life's a Beach

Found another one I missed -- not sure I have the energy to actually compare my library reviews to my personal site but it is becoming clear to me that I have taken the library reviews a bit more seriously of late... oops.

I've been enjoying a summer beach read all week as our (hopefully LAST) winter snow melts and imagining warmer locales.
Claire Cook, author of the popular Must Love Dogs, is back to doing what she does best -- writing about 40-something women's lives, romances, friendships and families.
In Life's a Beach,Ginger Walsh is 41 years old and she still hasn't figured out what to do with her life. She lives above her parent's garage, although her mother is pressuring her father to sell the house and move to a retirement village instead. She makes sea glass jewelry, although she suspects that her cat has a better artistic eye that she does. She drives around and babysits her older sister's kids, although she has a standard daily rate since this is an important source of income for her. She has a boyfriend, a cute glassblowing artist, although their relationship is so casual it might as well be nonexistant.
When a shark is spotted off the coast of their New England town, a horror movie come to film beach scenes and Ginger's nephew is cast in the film as a shark attackvictim. Since her older sister is busy having a midlife crisis about turning 50 and is caught up in her addiction to working from her Blackberry, Ginger is suddenly spending every day on a movie set as her nephew's guardian.
In this funny and all-too-human story, Claire Cook captures the two sisters perfectly as they each struggle to find themselves and both wonder if they have wasted too much time already. My favorite character is Ginger's father though, especially his antics visiting the town dump and bringing home "treasures" when he is supposed to be clearing out the house for his wife! This is a delightful read, and the audiobook narration by Kymberly Dakin is enjoyable and appropriately light. 7 hours listening.