At The Waters Edge by Sara Gruen

Genre: Historical Fiction 

Publisher: Spiegel & Grau

Pages: 368

Rating: ★★★


Synopsis
After embarrassing themselves at the social event of the year in high society Philadelphia on New Year’s Eve of 1942, Maddie and Ellis Hyde are cut off financially by Ellis’s father, a former army Colonel who is already embarrassed by his son’s inability to serve in WWII due to his being colorblind. To Maddie’s horror, Ellis decides that the only way to regain his father’s favor is to succeed in a venture his father attempted and very publicly failed at: he will hunt the famous Loch Ness monster and when he finds it he will restore his father’s name and return to his father’s good graces (and pocketbook). Joined by their friend Hank, a wealthy socialite, the three make their way to Scotland in the midst of war. Each day the two men go off to hunt the monster, while another monster, Hitler, is devastating Europe. And Maddie, now alone in a foreign country, must begin to figure out who she is and what she wants. The novel tells of Maddie’s social awakening: to the harsh realities of life, to the beauties of nature, to a connection with forces larger than herself, to female friendship, and finally, to love.

My Thoughts

This book started out really promising. I was loving the characters and the time period. Even though it does take place in 1942, the war isn't the central point, so it was interesting to see how the wealthy society people of Philadelphia stood out in comparison with the war. The attitudes of Ellis and Hank were deplorable (evading the draft, rudeness to the staff etc.) but Maddie's softness made up for it. 

Even though the plot line of the story seemed a little strange to me, I was really excited for them to go to Scotland to find the Loch Ness monster. Once they were in Scotland there was a huge shift in the plot. The monster hunting was put on the back burner and we began to see more of Maddie's daily life at the inn they were staying at and her relationships with the people she met. 

Eventually, the book became a tad cheesy and very predictable. The ending, as I predicted, was tied up in a neat bow which was annoying and cliche. Also, Gruen would dump random wartime statistics in paragraph long sections that did nothing at all to move the plot along. This only served to remind you that  it was in fact 1942 and not present day.

My Favorite Line

In all its beautiful, tragic fragility, there was still life, and those of us who'd been lucky enough to survive opened our arms wide and embraced it