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BEACH READ

Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 07/28/06

BY PATTI MARTIN
STAFF WRITER

Nora Roberts certainly knows how to tell a tale.

And in her latest offering, Roberts delivers a real page-turner — a whodunit that keeps you reading whether you're sitting at the beach or curled up in bed.

After surviving a deadly shooting that killed 12 of her friends and co-workers, Reece Gilmore is on the run, fighting the nightmares and panic attacks that haunt her.

After stopping in Angel's Fist in Wyoming because of car trouble, the emotionally fragile young woman decides to stay a while, and takes a job as a cook at the local diner.

Reece quickly finds sanctuary in the small town nestled in the Grand Tetons, and slowly begins her emotional healing. Life is good until Reece claims to have witnessed a murder while hiking along the Snake River.

With the exception of Angel Fist's resident mystery writer, Brody, no one seems to believe the town newcomer: Not Sheriff Rick Mardson, who hasn't found any clear evidence of a woman struck down near the river; not Doc Wallace, who is suspicious of Reece's fragile mental state, and not Reece's boss, Joanie, who isn't about to give her cook any slack while running a busy kitchen.

Roberts casts a wide net over the suspects. Is it a local resident? Some one from Reece's past? Or someone much, much closer?

Reece is forced to confront her past and present if she ever hopes to have a future. Like all of Roberts books, the quest for the truth will keep fans reading — and guessing — right up to the very end.