Beleaguered orderly at a retirement home for elderly authors
and
publishing professionals, Cecibel Bringer is beside herself
when her
favorite author, and formerly notorious lothario, Alphonse
Carducci
moves into the home to spend his final days among his peers.
While
he's not as strong as he was in his younger days, his witty
mind is
voraciously inspired for the first time in years... Seeing
Cecibel, a
private woman whose face shows the terrible accident she was
in years
before, Alphonse is determined to learn more about his new
muse and
what she's hiding.
What no one expects is for a ragtag group of elderly authors
and
editors to come together and work on what will become the
last new
project to keep them motivated through the winters of their
lives.
Alphonse creates Aldo and Cecelia, two star-crossed lovers
who carry
secrets that the other may never fully understand. Cecibel
finds her
own inspiration from the story she herself has inspired, and
it will
change her, and what is left of Alphonse's, life.
THE BAR HARBOR RETIREMENT HOME
FOR FAMOUS WRITERS (AND THEIR MUSES) by Terri-Lynne
DeFino is a fascinating tale
of authors, their muses, and their fans. Cecibel, something
of an
unreliable narrator (or at least one keeping secrets from
readers), is an
engaging and empathetic main character. Her face, marred by an
accident that she may or may not have caused years before,
serves as
a wall that keeps a thick barrier between her and the
residents at the
Bar Harbor retirement home. It's not until her favorite
author comes to
live at the home that those walls come crashing down, and
Cecibel
begins to learn what she is capable of, and the life she has
purposely
kept away from. The story that Alphonse and his cohorts are
writing,
set in the 1950s, is a heartbreaking but sincere story of
love and what
lengths people will go to do what they believe is the right
thing, and is
an interesting juxtaposition to the 1999-set reality. At
times both
stories are a little too long, but they wrap up in a
satisfying ending that
brings everything to a justified and capable conclusion. The
rest of the
ensemble cast of authors, editors, and agents are a joy to
read about.
A whimsical, moving novel about a retirement home for
literary legends who spar, conjure up new stories, and
almost magically change the lives of the people around
them.
Alfonse Carducci was a literary giant who lived his life
to excess—lovers, alcohol, parties, and literary
rivalries. But now he's come to the Bar Harbor Home for
the Elderly to spend the remainder of his days among
kindred spirits: the publishing industry's nearly gone
but never forgotten greats. Only now, at the end of his
life, does he comprehend the price of appeasing every
desire, and the consequences of forsaking love to pursue
greatness. For Alfonse has an unshakeable case of
writer's block that distresses him much more than his
precarious health.
Set on the water in one of New England's most beautiful
locales, the Bar Harbor Home was established specifically
for elderly writers needing a place to live out their
golden years—or final days—in understated luxury and
surrounded by congenial literary company. A faithful
staff of nurses and orderlies surround the writers, and
are drawn into their orbit, as they are forced to reckon
with their own life stories. Among them are Cecibel
Bringer, a young woman who knows first-hand the cost of
chasing excess. A terrible accident destroyed her face
and her sister in a split-second decision that Cecibel
can never forgive, though she has tried to forget. Living
quietly as an orderly, refusing to risk again the cost of
love, Cecibel never anticipated the impact of meeting her
favorite writer, Alfonse Carducci—or the effect he would
have on her existence. In Cecibel, Alfonse finds a muse
who returns him to the passion he thought he lost. As the
words flow from him, weaving a tale taken up by the other
residents of the Pen, Cecibel is reawakened to the idea
of love and forgiveness.
As the edges between story and reality blur, a world
within a world is created. It’s a place where the old are
made young, the damaged are made whole, and anything is
possible….
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