The Time Between by Karen White

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The Time Between
352 pages; NAL
"The relationship between sisters is a little piece of heaven and hell," writes Karen White. And boy, does Eleanor Murray, the heroine of her novel (or something-otherwise it's hard to track who Eleanor is—her sister? Is this a memoir?) endure a few too many years of the latter. Blamed for the paralysis of Eve, her older sister, Eleanor gives up her dreams of becoming a pianist, instead toiling as an underling at an investment banking firm to support her family. That is, until she takes a second? Another? Is asked by the boss? job working for her boss's elderly Aunt Helena on beach-lined, dreamy Edisto Island, where some mossy old secrets from the past come up—and change everything. Set in the marshes and sweetgrass of South Carolina, The Time Between can get a little heavy-handed on its bucolic descriptions (expect plenty of "pluff mud" and "Confederate jasmine"), but White's dizzying carousel of a plot keeps those pages turning, so much so that the book can—and should be—finished in one afternoon, interrupted only by a glass of sweet iced tea.
— Lindsay MaHarry