"The First Years Of Summer"
by Liz and Tom Q. MacClintock
Copyright ©2002
ISBN: 0-87714-761-2 eBook edition
ISBN: 0-87714-284-X PB edition
All rights reserved by Denlinger's Publishers, including the right to reproduce this electronic book, or portions thereof, in any form, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.
This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.
THE AUTHOR
These authors are Denlinger's "regulars" having written Hearts That Cross an Ocean. That nonfiction is their story, told through their letters, as to how they met online, fell in love, and got together over a ten thousand mile distance. Liz is an Australian and Tom's an American. They married in May, 1998, and they live and write from a small town on Australia's South Coast.
Although love stories are necessarily their forte, they also bring vast life experience to the tales they write. In this case, Tom was an interstate trucker. Between 1988 and 1996 he pulled freight over nearly a million miles of highway in all weather, all kinds of ter-rain, and 44 of the 48 Contiguous United States. Hence, all detail in Big Truck, Tender Heart is based on fact. Rarely would one find a novel so accurate in its supporting material. Past Hurts Healed is another tale set in 1997 on Australia’s South Coast, a kinder, gentler and slower paced world where these authors live.
THE BOOK
Katherine Harrison had just about finished serving one of Robard Brothers Department Store’s typical, wealthy, attractive customers when Chris Paglia saw her from a distant aisle and was so struck by her loveliness, he was stopped dead in his tracks. A captive of a moment greater than his comprehension, he stood, awestruck, obstructing traffic.
Kate grew up as the responsible and caring only child of upper middle class parents. Her life became violently upset when, just after high school graduation in 1949, Lance, her steady boyfriend, coerced her into taking a trip with him during which she became pregnant. As was the practice at that time in families of the Harrisons’ social level, Kate took up residence in a home for unwed mothers, delivered her baby and, without question, gave it up for adoption.
With the exceptions of his strikingly handsome features and trim, athletic build, Christopher Anthony Paglia is an ordinary young man from a poor family. A work schedule heavy enough to support the academics that resulted in his earning a Masters in Economics allowed only good grades, but not the kind that bring offers tumbling in from major businesses — even in the boom year of 1955.
Our book is about the struggle for Chris’ establishment in his professional field and his winning the affections of his beloved Kate as she grows to love and trust him with a heart once broken nearly beyond repair. As the couple sets a wedding date, Lance returns vowing to find his illegitimate child and sue for custody. In a most unexpected but believable turn of events, Chris is placed in a critical position where he innocently contributes to Lance’s downfall.
The couple’s love for each other overcomes all the obstacles imposed by Chris’ humble circumstances, Kate’s youthful errors of judgement, and Lance’s desperate efforts to destroy them.
Our story, set in a time where pre-marital celibacy was not uncommon, has remarkable love scenes and no intercourse. Also in keeping with the good manners of the time, the dialog employs little profanity.
Our history of 1949 - 1955 Cleveland Ohio is unerringly accurate, our descriptive prose arresting, and our dialog stimulating. All of our characters, notably the women, are strong and quite dissimilar to the “Father Knows Best” reasoning assumed to be typical of the time.
The First Years of Summer is a happy tale set in a delightful time and place – 1955, Cleveland, Ohio. America was the world’s most powerful and prosperous nation with the most optimistic future. That world was the oyster of Chris and Katherine, two young and beautiful lovers who had every reason to be just as wildly optimistic as the time in which they lived. Although these lovers didn’t have everything, they had a lot of what it takes to make a lifelong romance. And Kate had something, something in her past, that rose up to test the fabric of her character and the strength of Chris’ commitment to her and to his ideals.
Go back nearly a half-century, before cell phones, moon landings, and jumbo jets, to an era when people had time for each other and their families, couples hesitated to kiss on the first date, and lovers strolled in the park holding hands.
Join these two as Chris sees Kate for the first time and is stopped dead in his tracks by her loveliness, sit in with them while they build a friendship to an exciting love then hang on while old circumstances stand in defiance as the innocence of Spring takes on the reality Summer.
Sample
He saw her and stopped dead in his tracks. Stock still and oblivious to the hurried shoppers navigating around him along the wide department store aisle. Despite her being a good fifty feet down another aisle to his right, her stunning beauty struck him like a javelin. Her hair, turned neatly inward in a perfect page boy, was a deep, dark auburn that set her eyes off like a couple of indigo sparks. Her complexion seemed flawless and he’d bet a week’s pay – if he had a week’s pay – it was not pancake. She stood straight, the wide shoulder pads adding style to the tasteful bodice of her rich dark brown wool dress that lay neat and close over her adequate bosom. The contrasting cloth belt cinched comfortably around her trim waist. Centered in her loveliness was a dazzling smile that occurred in bursts of varying magnitude as she waited on a customer.
Electronic Editions: ( * Disclaimer )
Download via Email $6.95
3.25" PC disk $6.95 + $2.55 shipping and handling each disk.
NEW - InstaBook paperback Edition
Denlinger's - the electronic book publisher for tomorrow's great authors... today!