Review – Tangled in Ivy by Ashley Farley #5paws @AshleyWFarley #WomensLit #Netgalley
Synopsis
From the bestselling author of Sweet Tea Tuesdays comes a story of true love that spans decades.
Lillian Alexander’s father is dying of cancer. When he rambles on in a morphine-delirium, Lillian can’t ignore the feeling he’s trying to tell her something. At his funeral days later, she encounters ghosts from her past who stir long-suppressed memories from the day her mother died twenty-seven years ago. Why, if her mother’s death was an accident, does Lillian harbor guilt, as though she were somehow to blame?
When Lillian and her twin sister, Layla, learn the Stoney family fortune is gone, Lillian fights to save her ancestral home on Charleston’s prestigious East Battery. Desperate to resolve her money problems and get answers to her questions about the past, she tears her father’s study apart in search of clues. She discovers a thumb drive in a hollowed-out hardback copy of For Whom the Bell Tolls. The thumb drive, marked For Lillian in his handwriting, contains her father’s memoir. Secluded in the family’s cottage on Wadmalaw Island, she immerses herself in her father’s account of his stormy relationship with her mother. What she learns sets her on a journey of self-discovery.
Tangled in Ivy is a tale of tortured souls and southern family dysfunction.
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Review
I simply love everything I ready by Ashley Farley and this story is no exception. There is something about her southern stories of women that are strong yet vulnerable and the families that surround them that draw in the reader and perhaps even have them relating to the various characters.
In this story we meet Lillian and Layla, twin sisters that don’t seem to have that close bond most twins, even sisters, might have together. They are as different as can be and the truth about their mother’s life and her death can either tear them apart even more or bring them together.
I enjoyed the story told from several viewpoints and different time periods. Learning more about Graham and Ivy’s life together was intriguing and explained so much of the family dysfunction. Sadly, Lillian and Layla learn all of this after his death, and had they known some of it before he died, perhaps they could have cleared the air of so much. The sisters might have even come to a better understanding of who they were and why there was such animosity between them that didn’t need to be there. It takes time to heal the rift, but even with that journey, there were many bumps in the road that added more drama to the story.
I think I stayed up way too late finishing this book but it was so worth it and while this book isn’t due to be published until June, grab it as soon as you can or go ahead and pre-order the book, you will be glad you did.
We give this book 5 paws up!
About the Author
Ashley Farley writes books about women for women. Her characters are mothers, daughters, sisters, and wives facing real-life issues. Her bestselling Sweeney Sisters series has touched the lives of many.
Ashley is a wife and mother of two young adult children. While she’s lived in Richmond, Virginia for the past 21 years, a piece of her heart remains in the salty marshes of the South Carolina Lowcountry, where she still calls home. Through the eyes of her characters, she captures the moss-draped trees, delectable cuisine, and kindhearted folk with lazy drawls that make the area so unique.
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