Are You Ready for a Fateful Tale at Sea?

When you spend enough time with Karen White and Beatriz Williams you learn to enjoy their sense of humor.  I very much enjoyed their discussions on what would be the next title of this novel that they worked on with Lauren Willig.  I was bummed when the Memory of Air was not chosen as the title.  The title chosen was The Glass Ocean and it tells quite the tale, of the Lusitania.

“May 2013

Her finances are in dire straits and bestselling author Sarah Blake is struggling to find a big idea for her next book. Desperate, she breaks the one promise she made to her Alzheimer’s-stricken mother and opens an old chest that belonged to her great-grandfather, who died when the RMS Lusitania was sunk by a German U-Boat in 1915. What she discovers there could change history. Sarah embarks on an ambitious journey to England to enlist the help of John Langford, a recently disgraced Member of Parliament whose family archives might contain the only key to the long-ago catastrophe. . . .

April 1915
Southern belle Caroline Telfair Hochstetter’s marriage is in crisis. Her formerly attentive industrialist husband, Gilbert, has become remote, pre-occupied with business . . . and something else that she can’t quite put a finger on. She’s hoping a trip to London in Lusitania’s lavish first-class accommodations will help them reconnect—but she can’t ignore the spark she feels for her old friend, Robert Langford, who turns out to be on the same voyage. Feeling restless and longing for a different existence, Caroline is determined to stop being a bystander, and take charge of her own life. . . .

Tessa Fairweather is traveling second-class on the Lusitania, returning home to Devon. Or at least, that’s her story. Tessa has never left the United States and her English accent is a hasty fake. She’s really Tennessee Schaff, the daughter of a roving con man, and she can steal and forge just about anything. But she’s had enough. Her partner has promised that if they can pull off this one last heist aboard the Lusitania, they’ll finally leave the game behind. Tess desperately wants to believe that, but Tess has the uneasy feeling there’s something about this job that isn’t as it seems. . . .

As the Lusitania steams toward its fate, three women work against time to unravel a plot that will change the course of their own lives . . . and history itself.” (Amazon)

My Thoughts: 

Another great story from three great ladies!  When I was in school, I remembered studying the Lusitania in history class.  I did not know that there were actual survivors from this wreck.  I loved the plot of this story because while some of it is fiction, the story is based in fact.  I wonder what kind of intelligence work went on during World War I?   The only negative is the pacing of the story sometimes did not hold my interest.  I thought it was an interesting story otherwise. 

To purchase a copy of The Glass Ocean here.

Rating:

4/5