Heavy on Martha's Vineyard, lighter on the beach and book club

⭐⭐⭐  

The Martha's Vineyard Beach and Book Club by Martha Hall Kelly is a good-enough book, set in Martha's Vineyard, mostly in 1942. There's a framing device of a character we don't spend enough time with to care about being told the story in 2016, and the book is inspired by the author's own family history on the island, which makes me feel slightly bad about not enjoying the book more.

My husband and I visited Martha's Vineyard on our honeymoon a few years ago and I quite enjoyed it, so I was interested in this book. The author's research shines and I loved seeing the world of 1942 on the island. Soldiers were stationed there, using it as training grounds for a future amphibious assault, while German U-boats lurked just off-shore. Nods are made to rationing, but there's an awful lot of baking going on. Still, wartime Martha's Vineyard truly comes to life.

There's a lovely story of found family; the book centers on Briar and Cadence Smith, who live with the grandmother on a farm up-island. Their brother Tom has just shipped off, but his girlfriend Bess is staying at the farm as well. Briar is 16 and obsessed with the details of the war; Cadence, 19, works at a beach club and dreams of working in publishing in New York. Kelly throws a bunch of plot into the book--a possible spy! Bess's horrible mother! Gram's poor health! An arrogant British officer! A dead German neighbor! Briar's reputation as "Briar the Liar"! Honestly, I never warmed to Briar; I would've appreciated more development there about how she became interested in war and ship models and things. I liked parts of Cadence's romance, but it felt rushed. Honestly, a lot of my problems with the book boil down to it being so crammed that nothing had room to breathe. Even the titular book club barely factored into the story--it was mostly just the main characters, who already live together, sitting around, talking. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society this isn't.

Also, on a more nit-picky note, the chapters almost entirely alternate between Briar and Cadence (with a very very occasional one from Mari in 2016). The chapters are labeled, which is helpful, but they're also all labeled with 1942. At first I assumed this meant that we'd be bopping around in time, but that wasn't the case at all; the action of the book takes place over maybe a month. We don't need the 1942 for all those chapters.

Ultimately, there are aspects of this book that are really well done. It would make for a decent beach read--particularly if you're on Martha's Vineyard.

Thank you to Netgalley and Ballantine for the free copy in exchange for my honest opinion.