Review - Body Surfing

The Latest Novel by Anita Shreve

Jul 1, 2007
Sandy Mitchell

Body Surfing by Anita Shreve - cover art courtesy of Little Brown

Once widowed, once divorced, and still under thirty, Sydney takes a summer off to tutor a wealthy couple's daughter at their "cottage" on the rugged New Hampshire coast.

She expects the sojourn to be restful and recuperative. What she doesn't expect is meeting the two handsome, competitive, and fascinating brothers. Sydney's life has taken several unexpected turns in the last few years. First she was married to a stunt pilot, whose dangerous profession finally got the better of her and she divorced him. Later, she married a doctor who, ironically, died while at work of a brain aneurism.

Now, 29 and suddenly single, Sydney is trying to decide how to continue her life. A summer at the New Hampshire shore, tutoring the Edwards' slow-learning daughter sounds like just the solution. Mrs. Edwards, however, is less than welcoming. With small gestures, she makes it clear that Sydney is part of the staff, not the family. Her husband, a retired professor, couldn't be more open and down-to-earth and Sydney feels an immediate connection with him.

Jeff and Ben

Several weeks into her stay with the Edwardses, the sons of the house show up for a weekend. Ben sells real estate and Jeff is a professor. Even though Jeff has a girlfriend, both men seem enraptured with Sydney, intensely and competitively so. Soon, Sydney is in the midst of old rivalries and tensions she doesn't even begin to understand.

A Love Triangle

Body Surfing is typical of Anita Shreve in that it takes a straightforward love story and adds a slightly dark twist to it. As always, there are unexpected wrinkles to the story and surprising plot turns. Fans of earlier Shreve works will note that the former owner of the Edwardes beach house in this novel was the pilot and his wife of her earlier novel.

Anita Shreve is an immensely readable novelist with well-constructed sentences and expertly-chosen words. This latest work is one of her best.

About Anita Shreve

Anita Shreve is a former high school teacher and the author of 13 novels, the most well-known of which is The Pilot's Wife, which was chosen by Oprah Winfrey in 1999 as one of her book club selections. Ms. Shreve is a past recipient of the PEN/L.L Winship award and the New England Book Award for fiction. Two of her novels -- The Pilot's Wife and The Weight of Water -- have been made into movies. Anita Shreve lives in Massachusetts with her husband and five children.